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THE   MINISTERS   CHAEGE 


OR 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER 


BY 


WILLIAM    D.    HOWELLS 

AUTHOR  OF  "THE  RISE  OF  SILAS  LAPHAM,"  "A  MODERN  INSTANCE," 
"INDIAN  SUMMER,"  ETC. 


BOSTON 

TICKNOR     AND     COMPANY 
1887 


UGL-MDFFIT3J 


Copyright,  1SSG, 
BY  WILLIAM  D.  HOWELLS. 


All  rights  reserved. 


ZHnibfrsttn  ^Drtss : 
JOHN  WILSON  AND  SON,  CAMBRIDGE. 


PS  2.0^5 


THE   MINISTER'S   CHARGE; 

OR,  THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER. 


I. 

ON  their  way  back  to  the  farm-house  where  they 
were  boarding,  Sewell's  wife  reproached  him  for 
what  she  called  his  recklessness.  "You  had  no 
right,"  she  said,  "to  give  the  poor  boy  false  hopes. 
You  ought  to  have  discouraged  him — that  would 
have  been  the  most  merciful  way — if  you  knew  the 
poetry  was  bad.  Now,  he  will  go  on  building  all 
sorts  of  castles  in  the  air  on  your  praise,  and  sooner 
or  later  they  will  come  tumbling  about  his  ears — 
just  to  gratify  your  passion  for  saying  pleasant 
things  to  people." 

"I  wish  you  had  a  passion  for  saying  pleasant 
things  to  me,  my  dear,"  suggested  her  husband 
evasively. 

"  Oh,  a  nice  time  I  should  have  !  " 

"  I  don't  know  about  your  nice  time,  but  I  feel 

pretty  certain  of  my  own.     How  do  you  know — Oh, 

do  get  up,  you  implacable  cripple  ! "  he  broke  off  to 

the  lame  mare  he  was  driving,  and  pulled  at  the  reins. 

A 


2  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"  Don't  saw  her  mouth  ! "  cried  Mrs.  Sewell. 

"  Well,  let  her  get  up,  then,  and  I  won't.  I  don't 
like  to  saw  her  mouth ;  but  I  have  to  do  something 
when  you  come  down  on  me  with  your  interminable 
consequences.  I  dare  say  the  boy  will  never  think 
of  my  praise  again.  And  besides,  as  I  was  saying 
when  this  animal  interrupted  me  with  her  ill-timed 
attempts  at  grazing,  how  do  you  know  that  I  knew 
the  poetry  was  bad  ? " 

"  How  1  By  the  sound  of  your  voice.  I  could 
tell  you  were  dishonest  in  the  dark,  David." 

"  Perhaps  the  boy  knew  that  I  was  dishonest  too," 
suggested  Sewell. 

"  Oh  no,  he  didn't.  I  could  see  that  he  pinned 
his  faith  to  every  syllable." 

"  He  used  a  quantity  of  pins,  then ;  for  I  was 
particularly  profuse  of  syllables.  I  find  that  it 
requires  no  end  of  them  to  make  the  worse  appear 
the  better  reason  to  a  poet  who  reads  his  own 
verses  to  you.  But  come,  now,  Lucy,  let  me  off  a 
syllable  or  two.  I — I  have  a  conscience,  you  know 
well  enough,  and  if  I  thought —  But  pshaw  !  I  've 
merely  cheered  a  lonely  hour  for  the  boy,  and  he  '11 
go  back  to  hoeing  potatoes  to-morrow,  and  that  will 
be  the  end  of  it." 

"  I  hope  that  will  be  the  end  of  it,"  said  Mrs. 
Sewell,  with  the  darkling  reserve  of  ladies  intimate 
with  the  designs  of  Providence. 

"Well,"  argued  her  husband,  who  was  trying  to 
keep  the  matter  from  being  serious,  "perhaps  he 
may  turn  out  a  poet  yet.  You  never  can  tell  where 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  3 

the  lightning  is  going  to  strike.  He  has  some  idea 
of  rhyme,  and  some  perception  of  reason,  and — yes, 
some  of  the  lines  were  musical.  His  general  attitude 
reminded  me  of  Piers  Plowman.  Didn't  he  recall 
Piers  Plowman  to  you  1 " 

"  I  'm  glad  you  can  console  yourself  in  that  way, 
David,"  said  his  wife  relentlessly. 

The  mare  stopped  again,  and  Sewell  looked  over 
his  shoulder  at  the  house,  now  black  in  the  twilight, 
on  the  crest  of  the  low  hill  across  the  hollow  behind 
them.  "I  declare,"  he  said,  "the  loneliness  of  that 
place  almost  broke  my  heart.  There  ! "  he  added, 
as  the  faint  sickle  gleamed  in  the  sky  above  the  roof, 
"I  've  got  the  new  moon  right  over  my  left  shoulder 
for  my  pains.  That 's  what  comes  of  having  a  sym 
pathetic  nature." 

The  boy  was  looking  at  the  new  moon,  across  the 
broken  gate  which  stopped  the  largest  gap  in  the  tum 
bled  stone  wall.  He  still  gripped  in  his  hand  the  man 
uscript  which  he  had  been  reading  to  the  minister. 

"  There,  Lem,"  called  his  mother's  voice  from  the 
house,  "I  guess  you've  seen  the  last  of  'em  for  one 
while.  I  'm  'fi:aid  you  '11  take  cold  out  there  'n  the 
dew.  Come  in,  child." 

The  boy  obeyed.  "  I  was  looking  at  the  new  moon, 
mother.  I  saw  it  over  my  right  shoulder.  Did  you 
hear — hear  him,"  he  asked,  in  a  broken  and  husky 
voice, — "  hear  how  he  praised  my  poetry,  mother  ? " 

"  Oh,   do  make  her  get  up,  David  ! "  cried  Mrs. 


4  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

Scwell.        "  These     mosquitoes     are     eating     me 
alive  ! " 

"  I  will  saw  her  mouth  all  to  the  finest  sort  of 
kindling-wood,  if  she  doesn't  get  up  this  very 
instant,"  said  Sewell,  jerking  the  reins  so  wildly  that 
the  mare  leaped  into  a  galvanic  canter,  and  conti 
nued  without  further  urging  for  twenty  paces.  "  Of 
course,  Lucy,"  he  resumed,  profiting  by  the  oppor 
tunity  for  conversation  which  the  mare's  temporary 
activity  afforded,  "I  should  feel  myself  greatly  to 
blame  if  I  thought  I  had  gone  beyond  mere  kindness 
in  my  treatment  of  the  poor  fellow.  But  at  first  I 
couldn't  realise  that  the  stuff  was  so  bad.  Their 
saying  that  he  read  all  the  books  he  could  get,  and 
was  writing  every  spare  moment,  gave  me  the  idea 
that  he  must  be  some  sort  of  literary  genius  in  the 
germ,  and  I  listened  on  and  on,  expecting  every 
moment  that  he  was  coming  to  some  passage  with  a 
little  lift  or  life  in  it ;  and  when  he  got  to  the  end, 
and  hadn't  come  to  it,  I  couldn't  quite  pull  myself 
together  to  say  so.  I  had  gone  there  so  full  of  the 
wish  to  recognise  and  encourage,  that  I  couldn't  turn 
about  for  the  other  thing.  Well !  I  shall  know 
another  time  how  to  value  a  rural  neighbourhood 
report  of  the  existence  of  a  local  poet.  Usually  there 
is  some  hardheaded  cynic  in  the  community  with 
native  perception  enough  to  enlighten  the  rest  as  to 
the  true  value  of  the  phenomenon  ;  but  there  seems 
to  have  been  none  here.  I  ought  to  have  come 
sooner  to  see  him,  and  then  I  could  have  had  a 
chance  to  go  again  and  talk  soberly  and  kindly  with 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.          5 

him,  and  show  him  gently  how  much  he  had  mis 
taken  himself.  Oh,  get  up  !  "  By  this  time  the 
mare  had  lapsed  again  into  her  habitual  absent- 
mindedness,  and  was  limping  along  the  dark  road 
with  a  tendency  to  come  to  a  full  stop,  from  step  to 
step.  The  remorse  in  the  minister's  soul  was  so  keen 
that  he  could  not  use  her  with  the  cruelty  necessary 
to  rouse  her  nagging  energies  ;  as  he  held  the  reins 
he  napped  his  elbows  up  toward  his  face,  as  if  they 
were  wings,  and  contrived  to  beat  away  a  few  of  the 
mosquitoes  with  them  ;  Mrs.  Sewell,  in  silent  exas 
peration,  fought  them  from  her  with  the  bough 
which  she  had  torn  from  an  overhanging  birch-tree. 

In  the  morning  they  returned  to  Boston,  and 
Sewell's  parish  duties  began  again  ;  he  was  rather 
faithfuller  and  busier  in  these  than  he  might  have 
been  if  he  had  not  laid  so  much  stress  upon  duties 
of  all  sorts,  and  so  little  upon  beliefs.  He  declared 
that  he  envied  the  ministers  of  the  good  old  times 
who  had  only  to  teach  their  people  that  they  would 
be  lost  if  they  did  not  do  right ;  it  was  much  simpler 
than  to  make  them  understand  that  they  were  often 
to  be  good  for  reasons  not  immediately  connected 
with  their  present  or  future  comfort,  and  that  they 
could  not  confidently  expect  to  be  lost  for  any  given 
transgression,  or  even  to  be  lost  at  all.  He  found  it 
necessary  to  do  his  work  largely  in  a  personal  way, 
by  meeting  and  talking  with  people,  and  this  took 
up  a  great  deal  of  his  time,  especially  after  the 
summer  vacation,  when  he  had  to  get  into  relations 
with  them  anew,  and  to  help  them  recover  themselves 


6  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

from  the  moral  lassitude  into  which  people  fall 
during  that  season  of  physical  recuperation. 

He  was  occupied  with  these  matters  one  morning 
late  in  October  when  a  letter  came  addressed  in  a 
handwriting  of  copybook  carefulness,  but  showing  in 
every  painstaking  stroke  the  writer's  want  of  training, 
which,  when  he  read  it,  filled  Sewell  with  dismay. 
It  was  a  letter  from  Lemuel  Barker,  whom  Sewell 
remembered,  with  a  pang  of  self-upbraiding,  as  the 
poor  fellow  he  had  visited  with  his  wife  the  evening 
before  they  left  Willoughby  Pastures;  and  it  enclosed 
passages  of  a  long  poem  which  Barker  said  he  had 
written  since  he  got  the  fall  work  done.  The 
passages  were  not  submitted  for  Se well's  criticism, 
but  were  offered  as  examples  of  the  character  of  the 
whole  poem,  for  which  the  author  wished  to  find  a 
publisher.  They  were  not  without  ideas  of  a  didactic 
and  satirical  sort,  but  they  seemed  so  wanting  in 
literary  art  beyond  a  mechanical  facility  of  versifica 
tion,  that  Sewell  wondered  how  the  writer  should 
have  mastered  the  notion  of  anything  so  literary  as 
publication,  till  he  came  to  that  part  of  the  letter  in 
which  Barker  spoke  of  their  having  had  so  much 
sickness  in  the  family  that  he  thought  he  would  try 
to  do  something  to  help  along.  The  avowal  of  this 
meritorious  ambition  inflicted  another  wound  upon 
Sewell's  guilty  consciousness ;  but  what  made  his 
blood  run  cold  was  Barker's  proposal  to  come  down  to 
Boston,  if  Sewell  advised,  and  find  a  publisher  with 
Sewell's  assistance. 

This  would  never  do,  and  the  minister  went  to 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.          7 

his  desk  with  the  intention  of  despatching  a  note  of 
prompt  and  total  discouragement.  But  in  crossing 
the  room  from  the  chair  into  which  he  had  sunk, 
with  a  cheerful  curiosity,  to  read  the  letter,  he  could 
not  help  some  natural  rebellion  against  the  punish 
ment  visited  upon  him.  He  could  not  deny  that 
he  deserved  punishment,  but  he  thought  that  this, 
to  say  the  least,  was  very  ill-timed.  He  had  often 
warned  other  sinners  who  came  to  him  in  like 
resentment  that  it  was  this  very  quality  of  inoppor- 
tuneness  that  was  perhaps  the  most  sanative  and 
divine  property  of  retribution;  the  eternal  justice 
fell  upon  us,  he  said,  at  the  very  moment  when  we 
were  least  able  to  bear  it,  or  thought  ourselves  so ; 
but  now  in  his  own  case  the  clear-sighted  prophet 
cried  out  and  revolted  in  his  heart.  It  was  Saturday 
morning,  when  every  minute  was  precious  to  him 
for  his  sermon,  and  it  would  take  him  fully  an  hour 
to  write  that  letter;  it  must  be  done  with  the 
greatest  sympathy ;  he  had  seen  that  this  poor 
foolish  boy  was  very  sensitive,  and  yet  it  must  be 
done  with  such  thoroughness  as  to  cut  off  all  hope 
of  anything  like  literary  achievement  for  him. 

At  the  moment  Sewell  reached  his  desk,  with  a 
spirit  disciplined  to  the  sacrifice  required  of  it,  he 
heard  his  wife's  step  outside  his  study  door,  and  he 
had  just  time  to  pull  open  a  drawer,  throw  the  letter 
into  it,  and  shut  it  again  before  she  entered.  He 
did  not  mean  finally  to  conceal  it  from  her,  but  he 
was  willing  to  give  himself  breath  before  he  faced 
her  with  the  fact  that  he  had  received  such  a  letter. 


8  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

Nothing  in  its  way  was  more  terrible  to  this  good 
man  than  the  righteousness  of  that  good  woman. 
In  their  case,  as  in  that  of  most  other  couples 
who  cherish  an  ideal  of  dutiful  living,  she  was  the 
custodian  of  their  potential  virtue,  and  he  was  the 
instrument,  often  faltering  and  imperfect,  of  its 
application  to  circumstances;  and  without  wishing 
to  spare  himself  too  much,  he  was  sometimes  aware 
that  she  did  not  spare  him  enough.  She  worked 
his  moral  forces  as  mercilessly  as  a  woman  uses  the 
physical  strength  of  a  man  when  it  is  placed  at  her 
direction. 

"  What  is  the  matter,  David  1  "  she  asked,  with  a 
keen  glance  at  the  face  he  turned  upon  her  over  his 
shoulder. 

"Nothing  that  I  wish  to  talk  of  at  present, 
my  dear,"  answered  Sewell,  with  a  boldness  that  he 
knew  would  not  avail  him  if  she  persisted  in  knowing. 

"  Well,  there  would  be  no  time  if  you  did,"  said 
his  wife.  "  I  'm  dreadfully  sorry  for  you,  David, 
but  it  }s  really  a  case  you  can't  refuse.  Their  own 
minister  is  taken  sick,  and  it's  appointed  for  this 
afternoon  at  two  o'clock,  and  the  poor  thing  has  set 
her  heart  upon  having  you,  and  you  must  go.  In 
fact,  I  promised  you  would.  I  '11  see  that  you  're  not 
disturbed  this  morning,  so  that  you  '11  have  the  whole 
forenoon  to  yourself.  But  I  thought  I  'd  better  tell 
you  at  once.  It 's  only  a  child— a  little  boy.  You 
won't  have  to  say  much." 

"Oh,  of  course  I  must  go,"  answered  Sewell,  with 
impatient  resignation;  and  when  his  wife  left  the 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.    9 

room,  which  she  did  after  praising  him  and  pitying 
him  in  a  way  that  was  always  very  sweet  to  him, 
he  saw  that  he  must  begin  his  sermon  at  once,  if  he 
meant  to  get  through  with  it  in  time,  and  must  put 
off  all  hope  of  replying  to  Lemuel  Barker  till  Monday 
at  least.  But  he  chose  quite  a  different  theme  from 
that  on  which  he  had  intended  to  preach.  By  an 
immediate  inspiration  he  wrote  a  sermon  on  the 
text,  "  The  tender  mercies  of  the  wicked  are  cruel," 
in  which  he  taught  how  great  harm  could  be  done 
by  the  habit  of  saying  what  are  called  kind  things. 
He  showed  that  this  habit  arose  not  from  goodness 
of  heart,  or  from  the  desire  to  make  others  happy, 
but  from  the  wish  to  spare  one's-self  the  troublesome 
duty  of  formulating  the  truth  so  that  it  would  per 
form  its  heavenly  office  without  wounding  those 
whom  it  was  intended  to  heal.  He  warned  his 
hearers  that  the  kind  things  spoken  from  this  motive 
were  so  many  sins  committed  against  the  soul  of  the 
flatterer  and  the  soul  of  him  they  were  intended  to 
flatter;  they  were  deceits,  lies;  and  he  besought 
all  within  the  sound  of  his  voice  to  try  to  practise 
with  one  another  an  affectionate  sincerity,  which 
was  compatible  not  only  with  the  brotherliness  of 
Christianity,  but  the  politeness  of  the  world.  He 
enforced  his  points  with  many  apt  illustrations,  and 
he  treated  the  whole  subject  with  so  much  fulness 
and  fervour,  that  he  fell  into  the  error  of  the  literary 
temperament,  and  almost  felt  that  he  had  atoned 
for  his  wrongdoing  by  the  force  with  which  he  had 
portrayed  it. 


10  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

Mrs.  Sewell,  who  did  not  always  go  to  her  husband's 
sermons,  was  at  church  that  day,  and  joined  him 
when  some  ladies  who  had  lingered  to  thank  him 
for  the  excellent  lesson  he  had  given  them  at  last 
left  him  to  her. 

"  Really,  David,"  she  said,  "  I  wondered  your 
congregation  could  keep  their  countenances  while 
you  were  going  on.  Did  you  think  of  that  poor  boy 
up  at  Willoughby  Pastures  when  you  were  writing 
that  sermon  1 " 

"Yes,  my  dear,"  replied  Sewell  gravely;  "he  was 
in  my  mind  the  whole  time." 

"  Well,  you  were  rather  hard  upon  yourself ;  and 
I  think  I  was  rather  too  hard  upon  you,  that  time, 
though  I  was  so  vexed  with  you.  But  nothing  has 
come  of  it,  and  I  suppose  there  are  cases  where 
people  are  so  lost  to  common  sense  that  you  can't  do 
anything  for  them  by  telling  them  the  truth." 

"But  you'd  better  tell  it,  all  the  same,"  said 
Sewell,  still  in  a  glow  of  righteous  warmth  from  his 
atonement;  and  now  a  sudden  temptation  to  play 
with  fire  seized  him.  "  You  wouldn't  have  excused 
me  if  any  trouble  had  come  of  it." 

"  No,  I  certainly  shouldn't,"  said  his  wife.  "  But 
I  don't  regret  it  altogether  if  it 's  made  you  see  what 
danger  you  run  from  that  tendency  of  yours.  What 
in  the  world' made  you  think  of  it  1 " 

"  Oh,  it  came  into  my  mind/'  said  Sewell. 

He  did  not  find  time  to  write  to  Barker  the  next 
day,  and  on  recurring  to  his  letter  he  saw  that  there 
was  no  danger  of  his  taking  another  step  without 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.        1 1 

his  advice,  and  he  began  to  postpone  it ;  when  he 
had  time  he  was  not  in  the  mood ;  he  waited  for  the 
time  and  the  mood  to  come  together,  and  he  also 
waited  for  the  most  favourable  moment  to  tell  his 
wife  that  he  had  got  that  letter  from  Barker  and  to 
ask  her  advice  about  answering  it.  If  it  had  been 
really  a  serious  matter,  he  would  have  told  her  at 
once ;  but  being  the  thing  it  was,  he  did  not  know 
just  how  to  approach  it,  after  his  first  concealment. 
He  knew  that,  to  begin  with,  he  would  have  to 
account  for  his  mistake  in  attempting  to  keep  it  from 
her,  and  would  have  to  bear  some  just  upbraiding 
for  this  unmanly  course,  and  would  then  be  miserably 
led  to  the  distasteful  contemplation  of  the  folly  by 
which  he  had  brought  this  trouble  upon  himself. 
Sewell  smiled  to  think  how  much  easier  it  was  to 
make  one's  peace  with  one's  God  than  with  one's 
wife ;  and  before  he  had  brought  himself  to  the 
point  of  answering  Barker's  letter,  there  came  a  busy 
season  in  which  he  forgot  him  altogether. 


II. 


ONE  day  in  the  midst  of  this  Sewell  was  called 
from  his  study  to  see  some  one  who  was  waiting  for 
him  in  the  reception-room,  but  who  sent  in  no  name 
by  the  housemaid. 

"  I  don't  know  as  you  remember  me,"  the  visitor 
said,  rising  awkwardly,  as  Sewell  came  forward  with 
a  smile  of  inquiry.  "  My  name  's  Barker." 

"  Barker  1 "  said  the  minister,  with  a  cold  thrill 
of  instant  recognition,  but  playing  with  a  factitious 
uncertainty  till  he  could  catch  his  breath  in  the 
presence  of  the  calamity.  "  Oh  yes  !  How  do  you 
do  1 "  he  said;  and  then  planting  himself  adven 
turously  upon  the  commandment  to  love  one's 
neighbour  as  one's-self,  he  added  :  "  I  'm  very  glad 
to  see  you  !  " 

In  token  of  his  content,  he  gave  Barker  his  hand 
and  asked  him  to  be  seated. 

The  young  man  Complied,  and  while  Sewell  waited 
for  him  to  present  himself  in  some  shape  that  he 
could  grapple  with  morally,  he  made  an  involuntary 
study  of  his  personal  appearance.  That  morning, 
before  starting  from  home  by  the  milk-train  that 


o 
12 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.        13 

left  Willoughby  Pastures  at  4.5,  Barker  had  given 
his  Sunday  boots  a  coat  of  blacking,  which  he  had 
eked  out  with  stove-polish,  and  he  had  put  on  his 
best  pantaloons,  which  he  had  outgrown,  and  which, 
having  been  made  very  tight  a  season  after  tight 
pantaloons  had  gone  out  of  fashion  in  Boston,  caught 
on  the  tops  of  his  boots  and  stuck  there  in  spite  of 
his  efforts  to  kick  them  loose  as  he  stood  up,  and  his 
secret  attempts  to  smooth  them  down  when  he  had 
reseated  himself.  He  wore  a  single-breasted  coat 
of  cheap  broadcloth,  fastened  across  his  chest  with  a 
carnelian  clasp-button  of  his  father's,  such  as  country 
youth  wore  thirty  years  ago,  and  a  belated  summer 
scarf  of  gingham,  tied  in  a  breadth  of  knot  long  since 
abandoned  by  polite  society. 

Sewell  had  never  thought  his  wife's  reception-room 
very  splendidly  appointed,  but  Barker  must  have 
been  oppressed  by  it,  for  he  sat  in  absolute  silence 
after  resuming  his  chair,  and  made  no  sign  of  intend 
ing  to  open  the  matter  upon  which  he  came.  In 
the  kindness  of  his  heart  Sewell  could  not  refrain 
from  helping  him  on. 

"  When  did  you  come  to  Boston  1  "  he  asked  with 
a  cheeriness  which  he  was  far  from  feeling. 

"This  morning,"  said  Barker  briefly,  but  without 
the  tremor  in  his  voice  which  Sewell  expected. 

"You've  never  been  here  before,  I  suppose," 
suggested  Sewell,  with  the  vague  intention  of 
generalising  or  particularising  the  conversation,  as 
the  case  might  be. 

Barker  abruptly  rejected  the  overture,  whatever 


14  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

it  was.  "  I  don't  know  as  you  got  a  letter  from  me 
a  spell  back,"  he  said. 

"Yes,  I  did,"  confessed  Sewell.  "I  did  receive 
that  letter,"  he  repeated,  "  and  I  ought  to  have 

answered  it  long  ago.  But  the  fact  is "  He 

corrected  himself  when  it  came  to  his  saying  this, 
and  said,  "  I  mean  that  I  put  it  by,  intending  to 
answer  it  when  I  could  do  so  in  the  proper  way, 
until,  I  'm  very  sorry  to  say,  I  forgot  it  altogether. 
Yes,  I  forgot  it,  and  I  certainly  ask  your  pardon  for 
my  neglect.  But  I  can't  say  that  as  it 's  turned  out 
I  altogether  regret  it.  I  can  talk  with  you  a  great 
leal  better  than  I  could  write  to  you  in  regard  to 
your  " —  Sewell  hesitated  between  the  words  poems 
and  verses,  and  finally  said  —  "  work.  I  have 
blamed  myself  a  great  deal,"  he  continued,  winc 
ing  under  the  hurt  which  he  felt  that  he  must  be 
inflicting  on  the  young  man  as  well  as  himself,  "  for 
not  being  more  frank  with  you  when  I  saw  you  at 
home  in  September.  I  hope  your  mother  is  well  ? " 

"  She  's  middling,"  said  Barker,  "but  my  married 
sister  that  came  to  live  with  us  since  you  was  there 
has  had  a  good  deal  of  sickness  in  her  family.  Her 
husband  's  laid  up  with  the  rheumatism  most  of  the 
time." 

"  Oh  !  "  murmured  Sewell  sympathetically.  "  Well ! 
I  ought  to  have  told  you  at  that  time  that  I  could 
not  see  much  hope  of  your  doing  acceptable  work  in 
a  literary  way ;  and  if  I  had  supposed  that  you  ever 
expected  to  exercise  your  faculty  of  versifying  to 
any  serious  purpose, — for  anything  but  your  own 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.    15 

pleasure  and  entertainment, — I  should  certainly  have 
done  so.  And  I  tell  you  now  that  the  specimens  of 
the  long  poem  you  have  sent  me  give  me  even  less 
reason  to  encourage  you  than  the  things  you  read 
me  at  home." 

Sewell  expected  the  audible  crash  of  Barker's  air- 
castles  to  break  the  silence  which  the  young  man 
suffered  to  follow  upon  these  words  ;  but  nothing  of 
the  kind  happened,  and  for  all  that  he  could  see, 
Barker  remained  wholly  unaffected  by  what  he  had 
said.  It  nettled  Sewell  a  little  to  see  him  apparently 
so  besotted  in  his  own  conceit,  and  he  added  :  "But 
I  think  I  had  better  not  ask  you  to  rely  altogether 
upon  my  opinion  in  the  matter,  and  I  will  go  with 
you  to  a  publisher,  and  you  can  get  a  professional 
judgment.  Excuse  me  a  moment." 

He  left  the  room  and  went  slowly  upstairs  to  his 
wife.  It  appeared  to  him  a  very  short  journey  to 
the  third  story,  where  he  knew  she  was  decking 
the  guest-chamber  for  the  visit  of  a  friend  whom 
they  expected  that  evening.  He  imagined  himself 
saying  to  her  when  his  trial  was  well  over  that  he 
did  not  see  why  she  complained  of  those  stairs ; 
that  he  thought  they  were  nothing  at  all.  But  this 
sense  of  the  absurdity  of  the  situation  which  played 
upon  the  surface  of  his  distress  flickered  and  fled 
at  sight  of  his  wife  bustling  cheerfully  about,  and 
he  was  tempted  to  go  down  and  get  Barker  out  of 
the  house,  and  out  of  Boston  if  possible,  without 
letting  her  know  anything  of  his  presence. 

"Well1?"  said  Mrs.  Sewell,  meeting  his  face  of 


1 6  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

perplexity  with  a  penetrating  glance.  "  What  is 
it,  David  1 " 

"  Nothing.  That  is — everything  !  Lemuel  Bar 
ker  is  here  ! " 

"Lemuel  Barker?  Who  is  Lemuel  Barker?" 
She  stood  with  the  pillow-sham  in  her  hand  which 
she  was  just  about  to  fasten  on  the  pillow,  and 
Sewell  involuntarily  took  note  of  the  fashion  in 
which  it  was  ironed. 

"  Why,  surely  you  remember !  That  simpleton 
at  Willoughby  Pastures."  If  his  wife  had  dropped 
the  pillow-sham,  and  sunk  into  a  chair  beside  the 
bed,  fixing  him  writh  eyes  of  speechless  reproach ; 
if  she  had  done  anything  dramatic,  or  said  anything 
tragic,  no  matter  how  unjust  or  exaggerated,  Sewell 
could  have  borne  it ;  but  she  only  went  on  tying 
the  sham  on  the  pillow,  without  a  wrord.  "  The  fact 
is,  he  wrote  to  me  some  weeks  ago,  and  sent  me  some 
specimens  of  a  long  poem." 

"Just  before  you  preached  that  sermon  on  the 
tender  mercies  of  the  wicked  1 " 

"Yes,"  faltered  Sewell.  "I  had  been  waiting  to 
show  you  the  letter." 

"  You  waited  a  good  while,  David." 

"I  know — I  know,"  said  Sewell  miserably.  "I 
was  waiting — waiting —  He  stopped,  and  then 

added  with  a  burst,  "  I  was  waiting  till  I  could  put 
it  to  you  in  some  favourable  light." 

"I'm  glad  you're  honest  about  it  at  last,  my 
dear ! " 

"  Yes.     And  while  I  was  waiting  I  forgot  Barker's 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.        17 

letter  altogether.  I  put  it  away  somewhere — I 
can't  recollect  just  where,  at  the  moment.  But  that 
makes  no  difference ;  he 's  here  with  the  whole  poem 
in  his  pocket,  now."  Sewell  gained  a  little  courage 
from  his  wife's  forbearance ;  she  knew  that  she 
could  trust  him  in  all  great  matters,  and  perhaps 
she  thought  that  for  this  little  sin  she  would  not 
add  to  his  punishment.  "And  what  I  propose  to 
do  is  to  make  a  complete  thing  of  it,  this  time. 
Of  course,"  he  went  on  convicting  himself,  "I  see 
that  I  shall  inflict  twice  the  pain  that  I  should  have 
done  if  I  had  spoken  frankly  to  him  at  first ;  and 
of  course  there  will  be  the  added  disappointment, 
and  the  expense  of  his  coming  to  Boston.  But," 
he  added  brightly,  "we  can  save  him  any  expense 
while  he 's  here,  and  perhaps  I  can  contrive  to  get 
him  to  go  home  this  afternoon." 

"  He  wouldn't  let  you  pay  for  his  dinner  out  of 
the  house  anywhere,"  said  Mrs.  Sewell.  "You  must 
ask  him  to  dinner  here." 

"Well,"  said  Sewell,  with  resignation;  and  sus 
pecting  that  his  wife  was  too  much  piqued  or  hurt 
by  his  former  concealment  to  ask  what  he  now 
meant  to  do  about  Barker,  he  added  :  "  I  'm  going 
to  take  him  round  to  a  publisher  and  let  him  con 
vince  himself  that  there's  no  hope  for  him  in  a 
literary  way." 

"  David ! "  cried  his  wife  ;  and  now  she  left  off 
adjusting  the  shams,  and  erecting  herself  looked  at 
him  across  the  bed,  "  You  don't  intend  to  do  any 
thing  so  cruel." 

B 


18  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;   OR, 

"Cruel?" 

"  Yes  !  Why  should  you  go  and  waste  any  pub 
lisher's  time  by  getting  him  to  look  at  such  rubbish  ? 
Why  should  you  expose  the  poor  fellow  to  the  mor 
tification  of  a  perfectly  needless  refusal1?  Do  you 
want  to  shirk  the  responsibility — to  put  it  on  some 
one  else  ? " 

"No  ;  you  know  I  don't." 

"  Well,  then,  tell  him  yourself  that  it  won't  do." 

"I  have  told  him." 

"  What  does  he  say  ?  " 

"  He  doesn't  say  anything.  I  can't  make  out 
whether  he  believes  me  or  not." 

"  Very  well,  then  ;  you  Ve  done  your  duty,  at  any 
rate."  Mrs.  Sewell  could  not  forbear  saying  also, 
"If  you'd  done  it  at  first,  David,  there  wouldn't 
have  been  any  of  this  trouble." 

"  That's  true,"  owned  her  husband,  so  very  humbly 
that  her  heart  smote  her. 

"Well,  go  down  and  tell  him  he  must  stay  to 
dinner,  and  then  try  to  get  rid  of  him  the  best  way 
you  can.  Your  time  is  really  too  precious,  David, 
to  be  wasted  in  this  way.  You  must  get  rid  of  him, 
somehow." 

Sewell  went  back  to  his  guest  in  the  reception- 
room,  who  seemed  to  have  remained  as  immovably 
in  his  chair  as  if  he  had  been  a  sitting  statue  of  him 
self.  He  did  not  move  when  Sewell  entered. 

"On  second  thoughts,"  said  the  minister,  "I 
believe  I  will  not  ask  you  to  go  to  a  publisher  with 
me,  as  I  had  intended ;  it  would  expose  you  to  un- 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.        19 

necessary  mortification,  and  it  would  be,  from  my 
point  of  view,  an  unjustifiable  intrusion  upon  very 
busy  people.  I  must  ask  you  to  take  my  word  for 
it  that  no  publisher  would  bring  out  your  poem,  and 
it  never  would  pay  you  a  cent  if  he  did."  The  boy 
remained  silent  as  before,  and  Sewell  had  no  means 
of  knowing  whether  it  was  from  silent  conviction  or 
from  mulish  obstinacy.  "  Mrs.  Sewell  will  be  down 
presently.  She  wished  me  to  ask  you  to  stay  to 
dinner.  "We  have  an  early  dinner,  and  there  will  be 
time  enough  after  that  for  you  to  look  about  the 
city." 

"I  shouldn't  like  to  put  you  out,"  said  Barker. 

"  Oh,  not  at  all,"  returned  Sewell,  grateful  for  this 
sign  of  animation,  and  not  exigent  of  a  more  formal 
acceptance  of  his  invitation.  "  You  know,"  he  said, 
"  that  literature  is  a  trade,  like  every  other  vocation, 
and  that  you  must  serve  an  apprenticeship  if  you 
expect  to  excel.  But  first  of  all  you  must  have 
some  natural  aptitude  for  the  business  you  undertake. 
You  understand  1 "  asked  Sewell ;  for  he  had  begun 
to  doubt  whether  Barker  understood  anything.  He 
seemed  so  much  more  stupid  than  he  had  at  home  ; 
his  faculties  were  apparently  sealed  up,  and  he  had 
lost  all  the  personal  picturesqueness  which  he  had 
when  he  came  in  out  of  the  barn,  at  his  mother's 
call,  to  receive  Sewell. 

"Yes,"  said  the  boy. 

"I  don't  mean,"  continued  Sewell,  "that  I 
wouldn't  have  you  continue  to  make  verses  when 
ever  you  have  the  leisure  for  it.  I  think,  on  the 


20  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

contrary,  that  it  will  give  a  grace  to  your  life  which 
it  might  otherwise  lack.  AYe  are  all  in  daily 
danger  of  being  barbarised  by  the  sordid  details  of 
life ;  the  constantly  recurring  little  duties  which 
must  be  done,  but  which  we  must  not  allow 
to  become  the  whole  of  life."  Sewell  was  so 
much  pleased  with  this  thought,  when  it  had 
taken  form  in  words,  that  he  made  a  mental  note 
of  it  for  future  use.  "We  must  put  a  border  of 
pinks  around  the  potato-patch,  as  Emerson  would 
say,  or  else  the  potato-patch  is  no  better  than  a  field 
of  thistles."  Perhaps  because  the  logic  of  this  figure 
rang  a  little  false,  Sewell  hastened  to  add :  "  But 
there  are  many  ways  in  which  we  can  prevent  the 
encroachment  of  those  little  duties  without  being 
tempted  to  neglect  them,  which  would  be  still  worse. 
I  have  thought  a  good  deal  about  the  condition  of 
our  young  men  in  the  country,  and  I  have  sympa 
thised  with  them  in  what  seems  their  want  of  oppor 
tunity,  their  lack  of  room  for  expansion.  I  have 
often  wished  that  I  could  do  something  for  them — 
help  them  in  their  doubts  and  misgivings,  and  per 
haps  find  some  way  out  of  the  trouble  for  them.  I 
regret  this  tendency  to  the  cities  of  the  young  men 
from  the  country.  I  am  sure  that  if  we  could  give 
them  some  sort  of  social  and  intellectual  life  at  home, 
they  would  not  be  so  restless  and  dissatisfied." 

Sewell  felt  as  if  he  had  been  preaching  to  a  dead 
wall;  but  now  the  wall  opened,  and  a  voice  came 
out  of  it,  saying  :  "  You  mean  something  to  occupy 
their  minds  1 " 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.       21 

"  Exactly  so  ! "  cried  Sewell.  "^Something  to  occupy 
their  minds.  Now,"  he  continued,  with  a  hope  of 
getting  into  some  sort  of  human  relations  with  his 
guest  which  he  had  not  felt  before,  "  why  shouldn't 
a  young  man  on  a  farm  take  up  some  scientific  study, 
like  geology,  for  instance,  which  makes  every  inch  of 
earth  vocal,  every  rock  historic,  and  the  waste  places 
social  1 "  Barker  looked  so  blankly  at  him  that  he 
asked  again,  "  You  understand  ?  " 

"Yes,"  said  Barker ;  but  having  answered  Sewell's 
personal  question,  he  seemed  to  feel  himself  in  no 
wise  concerned  with  the  general  inquiry  which  Sewell 
had  made,  and  he  let  it  lie  where  Sewell  had  let  it 
drop.  But  the  minister  was  so  well  pleased  with 
the  fact  that  Barker  had  understood  anything  of 
what  he  had  said,  that  he  was  content  to  let  the 
notion  he  had  thrown  out  take  its  chance  of  future 
effect,  and  rising,  said  briskly  :  "  Come  upstairs  with 
me  into  my  study,  and  I  will  show  you  a  picture  of 
Agassiz.  It 's  a  very  good  photograph." 

He  led  the  way  out  of  the  reception-room,  and 
tripped  lightly  in  his  slippered  feet  up  the  steps 
against  which  Barker  knocked  the  toes  of  his  clumsy 
boots.  He  was  not  large,  nor  naturally  loutish,  but 
the  heaviness  of  the  country  was  in  every  touch  and 
movement.  He  dropped  the  photograph  twice  in 
his  endeavour  to  hold  it  between  his  stiff  thumb  and 
finger. 

Sewell  picked  it  up  each  time  for  him,  and  restored 
it  to  his  faltering  hold.  When  he  had  securely 
lodged  it  there,  he  asked  sweetly  :  "  Did  you  ever 


22  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

hear  what  Agassiz  said  when  a  scheme  was  once 
proposed  to  him  by  which  he  could  make  a  great 
deal  of  money  1 " 

"I  don't  know  as  I  did,"  replied  Barker. 
"  'But,  gentlemen,  I've  no  lime  to  make  money.' " 
Barker  received  the  anecdote  in  absolute  silence, 
standing  helplessly  with  the  photograph  in  his  hand ; 
and  Sewell  with  a  hasty  sigh  forbore  to  make  the 
application  to  the  ordinary  American  ambition  to  be 
rich  that  he  had  intended.  "  That  Js  a  photograph 
of  the  singer  Nilsson,"  he  said,  cataloguing  the  other 
objects  on  the  chimney-piece.  "  She  was  a  peasant, 
you  know,  a  country  girl  in  Norway.  That 's  Gr6vy, 
the  President  of  the  French  Republic;  his  father 
was  a  peasant.  Lincoln,  of  course.  Sforza,  throw 
ing  his  hoe  into  the  oak,"  he  said,  explaining  the 
picture  that  had  caught  Barker's  eye  on  the  wall 
above  the  mantel.  "  He  was  working  in  the  field, 
when  a  band  of  adventurers  came  by,  and  he  tossed 
his  hoe  at  the  tree.  If  it  fell  to  the  ground,  he 
would  keep  on  hoeing ;  if  it  caught  in  the  branches 
and  hung  there,  he  would  follow  the  adventurers. 
It  caught,  and  he  went  with  the  soldiers  and  became 
Duke  of  Milan.  I  like  to  keep  the  pictures  of  these 
great  Originals  about  me,"  said  Sewell,  "  because  in 
our  time,  when  we  refer  so  constantly  to  law,  we 
are  apt  to  forget  that  God  is  creative  as  well  as 
operative."  He  used  these  phrases  involuntarily; 
they  slipped  from  his  tongue  because  he  was  in 
the  habit  of  saying  this  about  these  pictures,  and  he 
made  no  effort  to  adapt  them  to  Barker's  compre- 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.       23 

hension,  because  he  could  not  see  that  the  idea 
would  be  of  any  use  to  him.  He  went  on  pointing 
out  the  different  objects  in  the  quiet  room,  and  he 
took  down  several  books  from  the  shelves  that 
covered  the  whole  wall,  and  showed  them  to  Barker, 
who,  however,  made  no  effort  to  look  at  them  for 
himself,  and  did  not  say  anything  about  them.  He 
did  what  Sewell  bade  him  do  in  admiring  this  thing 
or  that ;  but  if  he  had  been  an  Indian  he  could  not 
have  regarded  them  with  a  greater  reticence.  Sewell 
made  him  sit  down  from  time  to  time,  but  in  a 
sitting  posture  Barker's  silence  became  so  deathlike 
that  Sewell  hastened  to  get  him  on  his  legs  again, 
and  to  walk  him  about  from  one  point  to  another, 
as  if  to  keep  life  in  him,  At  the  end  of  one  of 
these  otherwise  aimless  excursions  Mrs.  Sewell 
appeared,  and  infused  a  gleam  of  hope  into  her 
husband's  breast.  Apparently  she  brought  none 
to  Barker ;  or  perhaps  he  did  not  conceive  it  polite 
to  show  any  sort  of  liveliness  before  a  lady.  He 
did  what  he  could  with  the  hand  she  gave  him  to 
shake,  and  answered  the  brief  questions  she  put  to 
him  about  his  family  to  precisely  the  same  effect  as 
he  had  already  reported  its  condition  to  Sewell. 

"  Dinner 's  ready  now,"  said  Mrs.  Sewell,  for  all 
comment.  She  left  the  expansiveness  of  sympathy 
and  gratulation  to  her  husband  on  most  occasions, 
and  on  this  she  felt  that  she  had  less  than  the  usual 
obligation  to  make  polite  conversation.  Her  two 
children  came  downstairs  after  her,  and  as  she 
unfolded  her  napkin  across  her  lap  after  grace  she 


24  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE. 

said,  "  This  is  my  son,  Alfred,  Mr.  Barker ;  and 
this  is  Edith."  Barker  took  the  acquaintance 
offered  in  silence,  the  young  Sewells  smiled  with 
the  wise  kindliness  of  children  taught  to  be  good 
to  all  manner  of  strange  guests,  and  the  girl 
cumbered  the  helpless  country  boy  with  offers  of 
different  dishes. 

Mr.  Sewell  as  he  cut  at  the  roast  beef  lengthwise, 
being  denied  by  his  wife  a  pantomimic  prayer  to 
be  allowed  to  cut  it  crosswise,  tried  to  make  talk 
with  Barker  about  the  weather  at  Willoughby 
Pastures.  It  had  been  a  very  dry  summer,  and  he 
asked  if  the  fall  rains  had  filled  up  the  springs. 
He  said  he  really  forgot  whether  it  was  an  apple 
year.  He  also  said  that  he  supposed  they  had  dug 
all  their  turnips  by  this  time.  He  had  meant  to 
say  potatoes  when  he  began,  but  he  remembered 
that  he  had  seen  the  farmers  digging  their  potatoes 
before  he  came  back  to  town,  and  so  he  substituted 
turnips  ;  afterwards  it  seemed  to  him  that  dig  was 
not  just  the  word  to  use  in  regard  to  the  harvesting 
of  turnips.  He  wished  he  had  said,  "got  your 
turnips  in,"  but  it  appeared  to  make  no  difference 
to  Barker,  who  answered,  "  Yes,  sir,"  and  "No,  sir," 
and  "  Yes,  sir,"  and  let  each  subject  drop  with  that. 


III. 


THE  silence  grew  so  deep  that  the  young  Sewells 
talked  together  in  murmurs,  and  the  clicking  of  the 
knives  on  the  plates  became  painful.  Sewell  kept 
himself  from  looking  at  Barker,  whom  he  nevertheless 
knew  to  be  changing  his  knife  and  fork  from  one 
hand  to  the  other,  as  doubt  after  doubt  took  him  as 
to  their  conventional  use,  and  to  be  getting  very 
little  good  of  his  dinner  in  the  process  of  settling 
these  questions.  The  door-bell  rang,  and  the  sound 
of  a  whispered  conference  between  the  visitor  and 
the  servant  at  the  threshold  penetrated  to  the 
dining-room.  Some  one  softly  entered,  and  then 
Mrs.  Sewell  called  out,  "  Yes,  yes !  Come  in ! 
Come  in,  Miss  Yane  !"  She  jumped  from  her  chair 
and  ran  out  into  the  hall,  where  she  was  heard  to 
kiss  her  visitor ;  she  reappeared,  still  holding  her 
by  the  hand,  and  then  Miss  Yane  shook  hands  with 
Sewell,  saying  in  a  tone  of  cordial  liking,  How  d'ye 
do?"  and  to  each  of  the  young  people  as  she  shook 
hands  in  turn  with  them,  "  How  d'ye  do,  dear  1 " 
She  was  no  longer  so  pretty  as  she  must  have  once 
been ;  but  an  air  of  distinction  and  a  delicate  charm 

25 


26  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

of  manner  remained  to  her  from  her  fascinating 
youth. 

Young  Sewell  pushed  her  a  chair  to  the  table, 
and  she  dropped  softly  into  it,  after  acknowledging 
Barker's  presentation  by  Mrs.  Sewell  with  a  kindly 
glance  that  probably  divined  him. 

"  You  must  dine  with  us,"  said  Mrs.  Sewell. 
"  You  can  call  it  lunch." 

"  No,  I  can't,  Mrs.  Sewell,"  said  Miss  Vane.  "  I 
could  once,  and  should  have  said  with  great  plea 
sure,  when  I  went  away,  that  I  had  been  lunching  at 
the  Sewells ;  but  I  can't  now.  I  've  reformed.  What 
have  you  got  for  dinner  ? " 

"Roast  beef,"  said  Sewell. 

"Nothing  I  dislike  more,"  replied  Miss  Vane. 
"  What  else  1"  She  put  on  her  glasses,  and  peered 
critically  about  the  table. 

"Stewed  tomatoes,  baked  sweet  potatoes,  maca 
roni." 

"How  unimaginative!  What  are  you  going  to 
have  afterwards  ? " 

"  Cottage  pudding." 

"  The  very  climax  of  the  commonplace.  Well  ! " 
Miss  Vane  began  to  pull  off  her  gloves,  and  threw 
her  veil  back  over  her  shoulder.  "  I  will  dine  with 
you,  but  when  I  say  dine,  and  people  ask  me  to 
explain,  I  shall  have  to  say,  '  Why,  the  Sewells  still 
dine  at  one  o'clock,  you  know,'  and  laugh  over  your 
old-fashioned  habits  with  them.  I  should  like  to 
do  differently,  and  to  respect  the  sacredness  of 
broken  bread  and  that  sort  of  thing  ;  but  I  'm  trying 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.       27 

to  practise  with  every  one  an  affectionate  sincerity, 
which  is  perfectly  compatible  not  only  with  the 
brotherliness  of  Christianity,  but  the  politeness  of 
the  world."  Miss  Vane  looked  demurely  at  Mrs. 
Sewell.  "I  can't  make  any  exceptions." 

The  ladies  both  broke  into  a  mocking  laugh,  in 
which  Sewell  joined  with  sheepish  reluctance ;  after 
all,  one  does  not  like  to  be  derided,  even  by  one's 
dearest  friends. 

"  As  soon  as  I  hear  my  other  little  sins  denounced 
from  the  pulpit,  I  'm  going  to  stop  using  profane 
language  and  carrying  away  people's  spoons  in  my 
pocket." 

The  ladies  seemed  to  think  this  also  a  very  good 
joke,  and  his  children  laughed  in  sympathy,  but 
Sewell  hung  his  head;  Barker  sat  bolt  upright 
behind  his  plate,  and  stared  at  Miss  Vane.  "  I 
never  have  been  all  but  named  in  church  before," 
she  concluded,  "and  I've  heard  others  say  the 
same." 

"  Why  didn't  you  come  to  complain  sooner  1 " 
asked  Sewell. 

"  Well,  I  have  been  away  ever  since  that  occasion. 
I  went  down  the  next  day  to  Newport,  and  I  Ve  been 
there  ever  since,  admiring  the  ribbon-planting." 

"  On  the  lawns  or  on  the  ladies  ?  "  asked  Sewell. 

"Both.  And  sowing  broadcast  the  seeds  of 
plain  speaking.  I  don't  know  what  Newport  will 
be  in  another  year  if  they  all  take  root." 

"I  dare  say  it  will  be  different,"  said  SewelL 
"I'm  not  sure  it  will  be  worse."  He  plucked  up 


28  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

a  little  spirit,  and  added  :  "  Now  you  see  of  how 
little  importance  you  really  are  in  the  community ; 
you  have  been  gone  these  three  weeks,  and  your 
own  pastor  didn't  know  you  were  out  of  town." 

"  Yes,  you  did,  David,"  interposed  his  wife.  "  I 
told  you  Miss  Vane  was  away  two  weeks  ago." 

"Did  you?  Well  I  forgot  it  immediately;  the 
fact  was  of  no  consequence,  one  way  or  the  other. 
How  do  you  like  that  as  a  bit  of  affectionate 
sincerity  1  " 

"  I  like  it  immensely,"  said  Miss  Vane.  "  It 's 
delicious.  I  only  wish  I  could  believe  you  were 
honest."  She  leaned  back  and  laughed  into  her 
handkerchief,  while  Sewell  regarded  her  with  a  face 
in  which  his  mortification  at  being  laughed  at  was 
giving  way  to  a  natural  pleasure  at  seeing  Miss 
Vane  enjoy  herself.  "  What  do  you  think,"  she 
asked,  "since  you're  in  this  mood  of  exasperated 
veracity — or  pretend  to  be — of  the  flower  charity  ? " 

"  Do  you  mean  by  the  barrel,  or  the  single  sack  1 
The  Graham,  or  the  best  Haxall,  or  the  health-food 
cold-blast  ?  "  asked  Sewell. 

Miss  Vane  lost  her  power  of  answering  in  another 
peal  of  laughter,  sobering  off,  and  breaking  down 
again  before  she  could  say,  "I  mean  cut  flowers  for 
patients  and  prisoners." 

"  Oh,  that  kind  !  I  don't  think  a  single  pansy 
would  have  an  appreciable  effect  upon  a  burglar  ; 
perhaps  a  bunch  of  forget-me-nots  might,  or  a  few 
lilies  of  the  valley  carelessly  arranged.  As  to  the 
influence  of  a  graceful  little  boutonnikrey  in  cases  of 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.       29 

rheumatism  or  cholera  morbus,  it  might  be  efficacious; 
but  I  can't  really  say." 

"  How  perfectly  cynical ! "  cried  Miss  Vane. 
"  Don't  you  know  how  much  good  the  flower  mission 
has  accomplished  among  the  deserving  poor  1 
Hundreds  of  bouquets  are  distributed  every  day. 
They  prevent  crime." 

"  That  shows  how  susceptible  the  deserving  poor 
are.  I  don't  find  that  a  bowl  of  the  most  expensive 
and  delicate  roses  in  the  centre  of  a  dinner-table 
tempers  the  asperity  of  the  conversation  when  it 
turns  upon  the  absent.  But  perhaps  it  oughtn't  to 
do  so." 

"  I  don't  know  about  that,"  said  Miss  Vane  ;  "  but 
if  you  had  an  impulsive  niece  to  supply  with  food 
for  the  imagination,  you  would  be  very  glad  of  any 
thing  that  seemed  to  combine  practical  piety  and 
picturesque  effect." 

"  Oh,  if  you  mean  that,"  began  Sewell  more 
soberly,  and  his  wife  leaned  forward  with  an  in 
terest  in  the  question  which  she  had  not  felt  while 
the  mere  joking  went  on. 

"Yes.  When  Sibyl  came  in  this  morning  with 
an  imperative  demand  to  be  allowed  to  go  off  and 
do  good  with  flowers  in  the  homes  of  virtuous 
poverty,  as  well  as  the  hospitals  and  prisons,  I 
certainly  felt  as  if  there  had  been  an  interposition, 
if  you  will  allow  me  to  say  so." 

Miss  Vane  still  had  her  joking  air,  but  a  note  of 
anxiety  had  crept  into  her  voice. 

"  I  don't  think  it  will  do  the  sick  and  poor  any 


30  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

harm,"  said  Sewell,  "and  it  may  do  Sibyl  some 
good."  He  smiled  a  little  in  adding  :  "  It  may  afford 
her  varied  energies  a  little  scope." 

Miss  Vane  shook  her  head,  and  some  lines  of  age 
came  into  her  face  which  had  not  shown  themselves 
there  before.  "And  you  would  advise  letting  her 
go  into  it?"  she  asked. 

"By  all  means,"  replied  Sewell.  "But  if  she's 
going  to  engage  actively  in  the  missionary  work,  I 
think  you  'd  better  go  with  her  on  her  errands  of 
mercy." 

"  Oh,  of  course,  she 's  going  to  do  good  in  person. 
What  she  wants  is  the  sensation  of  doing  good — of 
seeing  and  hearing  the  results  of  her  beneficence. 
She  'd  care  very  little  about  it  if  she  didn't." 

"  Oh,  I  don't  know  that  you  can  say  that,"  re 
plied  Sewell  in  deprecation  of  this  extreme  view. 
"I  don't  believe,"  he  continued,  "that  she  would 
object  to  doing  good  for  its  own  sake." 

"  Of  course  she  wouldn't,  David  !  Who  in  the 
world  supposed  she  would1?"  demanded  his  wife, 
bringing  him  up  roundly  at  this  sign  of  wandering, 
and  Miss  Vane  laughed  wildly. 

"  And  is  this  what  your  doctrine  of  sincerity  comes 
to  1  This  fulsomeness  !  You  're  very  little  better 
than  one  of  the  wicked,  it  seems  to  me  !  Well,  I 
hoped  that  you  would  approve  of  my  letting  Sibyl 
take  this  thing  up,  but  such  unbounded  encourage 
ment  !" 

"  Oh,  I  don't  wish  to  flatter,"  said  Sewell,  in  the 
spirit  of  her  raillery.  "  It  will  be  very  well  for  her 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.   31 

to  go  round  with  flowers;  but  don't  let  her,"  he 
continued  seriously — "  don't  let  her  imagine  it's  more 
than  an  innocent  amusement.  It  would  be  a  sort  of 
hideous  mockery  of  the  good  we  ought  to  do  one 
another  if  there  were  supposed  to  be  anything  more 
than  a  kindly  thoughtfulness  expressed  in  such  a 
thing." 

"  Oh,  if  Sibyl  doesn't  feel  that  it 's  real,  for  the 
time  being  she  won't  care  anything  about  it.  She 
likes  to  lose  herself  in  the  illusion,  she  says." 

"Well!"  said  Sewell  with  a  slight  shrug,  "then 
we  must  let  her  get  what  good  she  can  out  of  it  as 
an  exercise  of  the  sensibilities." 

"0  my  dear!"  exclaimed  his  wife.  "You  don't 
mean  anything  so  abominable  as  that !  I  Ve  heard 
you  say  that  the  worst  thing  about  fiction  and  the 
theatre  was  that  they  brought  emotions  into  play 
that  ought  to  be  sacred  to  real  occasions." 

"  Did  I  say  that  ?  Well,  I  must  have  been  right. 
I- 

Barker  made  a  scuffling  sound  with  his  boots  under 
the  table,  and  rose  to  his  feet.  "  I  guess,"  he  said, 
"  I  shall  have  to  be  going." 

They  had  all  forgotten  him,  and  Sewell  felt  as  if 
he  had  neglected  this  helpless  guest.  "Why,  no, 
you  mustn't  go  !  I  was  in  hopes  we  might  do  some 
thing  to  make  the  day  pleasant  to  you.  I  intended 
proposing " 

"Yes,"  his  wife  interrupted,  believing  that  he 
meant  to  give  up  one  of  his  precious  afternoons  to 
Barker,  and  hastening  to  prevent  the  sacrifice,  "  my 


32  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

son  will  show  you  the  Public  Garden  and  the  Com 
mon,  and  go  about  the  town  with  you."  She  rose 
too,  and  young  Sewell,  accustomed  to  suffer,  silently 
acquiesced.  "If  your  train  isn't  to  start  very 
soon " 

"I  guess  I  better  be  going,"  said  Barker,  and 
Mrs.  Sewell  now  gave  her  husband  a  look  conveying 
her  belief  that  Barker  would  be  happier  if  they  let 
him  go.  At  the  same  time  she  frowned  upon  the 
monstrous  thought  of  asking  him  to  stay  the  night 
with  them,  which  she  detected  in  Sewell's  face. 

She  allowed  him  to  say  nothing  but,  "I'm  sorry; 
but  if  you  really  must " 

"I  guess  I  better,"  persisted  Barker.  He  got 
himself  somehow  to  the  door,  where  he  paused  a 
moment,  and  contrived  to  pant,  "  Well,  good  day," 
and  without  effort  at  more  cordial  leave-taking,  passed 
out. 

Sewell  followed  him,  and  helped  him  find  his  hat, 
and  made  him  shake  hands.  He  went  with  him  to 
the  door,  and,  beginning  to  suffer  afresh  at  the  wrong 
he  had  done  Barker,  he  detained  him  at  the  thresh 
old.  "If  you  still  wish  to  see  a  publisher,  Mr. 
Barker,  I  will  gladly  go  with  you." 

"  Oh,  not  at  all,  not  at  all.  I  guess  I  don't  want 
to  see  any  publisher  this  afternoon.  Well,  good 
afternoon  !"  He  turned  away  from  Sewell's  remorse 
ful  pursuit,  and  clumsily  hurrying  down  the  steps, 
he  walked  up  the  street  and  round  the  next  corner. 
Sewell  stood  watching  him  in  rueful  perplexity, 
shading  his  eyes  from  the  mild  October  sun  with  his 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.       33 

hand;  and  some  moments  after  Barker  had  dis 
appeared,  he  remained  looking  after  him. 

When  he  rejoined  the  ladies  in  the  dining-room 
they  fell  into  a  conscious  silence. 

"Have  you  been  telling,  Lucy?"  he  asked. 

"  Yes,  I  Ve  been  telling,  David.  It  was  the  only 
way.  Did  you  offer  to  go  with  him  to  a  publisher 
again  1 " 

"  Yes,  I  did.     It  was  the  only  way,"  said  Sewell. 

Miss  Yane  and  his  wife  both  broke  into  a  cry  of 
laughter.  The  former  got  her  breath  first.  "So 
that  was  the  origin  of  the  famous  sermon  that  turned 
all  our  heads  grey  with  good  resolutions."  Sewell 
assented  with  a  sickly  grin.  "  What  in  the  world 
made  you  encourage  him  1 " 

"  My  goodness  of  heart,  which  I  didn't  take  the 
precaution  of  mixing  with  goodness  of  head  before  I 
used  it." 

Everything  was  food  for  Miss  Yane's  laugh,  even 
this  confession.  "But  what  is  the  natural  history  of 
the  boy  1  How  came  he  to  write  poetry  ]  What 
do  you  suppose  he  means  by  it  V 

"That  isn't  so  easy  to  say.  As  to  his  natural 
history,  he  lives  with  his  mother  in  a  tumbledown, 
unpainted  wooden  house  in  the  deepest  fastness  of 
Willoughby  Pastures.  Lucy  and  I  used  to  drive  by 
it  and  wonder  what  kind  of  people  inhabited  that 
solitude.  There  were  milk-cans  scattered  round  the 
door-yard,  and  the  Monday  we  were  there  a  poverty- 
stricken  wash  flapped  across  it.  The  thought  of  the 
place  preyed  upon  me  till  one  day  I  asked  about  it 
c 


34  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

at  the  post-office,  and  the  postmistress  told  me  that 
the  boy  was  quite  a  literary  character,  and  read 
everything  he  could  lay  his  hands  on,  and  'sat  up 
nights'  writing  poetry.  It  seemed  to  me  a  very 
clear  case  of  genius,  and  the  postmistress's  facts 
rankled  in  my  mind  till  I  couldn't  stand  it  any 
longer.  Then  I  went  to  see  him.  I  suppose  Lucy 
has  told  you  the  rest  1 " 

"  Yes,  Mrs.  Sewell  has  told  me  the  rest.  But  still 
I  don't  see  how  he  came  to  write  poetry.  I  believe 
it  doesn't  pay,  even  in  extreme  cases  of  genius." 

"  Ah,  but  that 's  just  what  this  poor  fellow  didn't 
know.  He  must  have  read  somewhere,  in  some 
deleterious  newspaper,  about  the  sale  of  some  large 
edition  of  a  poem,  and  have  had  his  own  wild  hopes 
about  it.  I  don't  say  his  work  didn't  show  sense ;  it 
even  showed  some  rude  strength,  of  a  didactic,  sati 
rical  sort,  but  it  certainly  didn't  show  poetry.  He 
might  have  taken  up  painting  by  a  little  different 
chance.  And  when  it  was  once  known  about  the 
neighbourhood  that  he  wrote  poetry,  his  vanity  was 
flattered " 

"  Yes,  I  see.  But  wasn't  there  any  kind  soul  to 
tell  him  that  he  was  throwing  his  time  away  ?" 

"It  appears  not." 

"  And  even  the  kind  soul  from  Boston,  who  visited 
him,"  suggested  Mrs.  Sewell.  "Go  on,  David." 

"  Visited  him  in  spite  of  his  wife's  omniscience,— 
even  the  kind  soul  from  Boston  paltered  with  this 
plain  duty.  Even  he,  to  spare  himself  the  pain  of 
hurting  the  boy's  feelings,  tried  to  find  some  of  the 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.   35 

lines  better  than  others,  and  left  him  with  the  im 
pression  that  he  had  praised  them." 

"Well,  that  was  pretty  bad,"  said  Miss  Yane. 
"You  had  to  tell  him  to-day,  I  suppose,  that  there 
was  no  hope  for  him  1 " 

"  Yes,  I  had  to  tell  him  at  last,  after  letting  him 
waste  his  time  and  money  in  writing  more  stuff  and 
coming  to  Boston  with  it.  I  Ve  put  him  to  needless 
shame,  and  I  Ve  inflicted  suffering  upon  him  that  I 
can't  lighten  in  the  least  by  sharing." 

"  No,  that 's  the  most  discouraging  thing  about 
pitying  people.  It  does  them  no  manner  of  good," 
said  Miss  Yane,  "and  just  hurts  you.  Don't  you 
think  that  in  an  advanced  civilisation  we  shall  cease 
to  feel  compassion  ?  Why  don't  you  preach  against 
common  pity,  as  you  did  against  common  politeness  T' 

"  Well,  it  isn't  quite  such  a  crying  sin  yet.  But 
really,  really,"  exclaimed  Sewell,  "  the  world  seems 
so  put  together  that  I  believe  we  ought  to  think 
twice  before  doing  a  good  action." 

"David  !"  said  his  wife  warningly. 

"Oh,  let  him  go  on!"  cried  Miss  Yane,  with  a 
laugh.  "  I  'm  proof  against  his  monstrous  doctrines. 
Go  on,  Mr.  Sewell." 

"What  I  mean  is  this."  Sewell  pushed  himself 
back  in  his  chair,  and  then  stopped. 

"  Is  what  1 "  prompted  both  the  ladies. 

"  Why,  suppose  the  boy  really  had  some  literary 
faculty,  should  I  have  had  any  right  to  encourage  it  1 
He  was  very  well  where  he  was.  He  fed  the  cows 
and  milked  them,  and  carried  the  milk  to  the  cross- 


36  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  j   OR, 

roads,  where  the  dealer  collected  it  and  took  it  to 
the  train.  That  was  his  life,  with  the  incidental 
facts  of  cutting  the  hay  and  fodder,  and  bedding  the 
cattle ;  and  his  experience  never  went  beyond  it.  I 
doubt  if  his  fancy  ever  did,  except  in  some  wild, 
mistaken  excursion.  Why  shouldn't  he  have  been 
left  to  this  condition  ?  He  ate,  he  slept,  he  fulfilled 
his  use.  Which  of  us  does  more  ?  " 

"  How  would  you  like  to  have  been  in  his  place  1 " 
asked  his  wife. 

"  I  couldn't  put  myself  in  his  place  ;  and  therefore 

I  oughtn't  to  have  done  anything  to  take  him  out  of 
it,"  answered  Sewell. 

"  It  seems  to  me  that 's  very  un-American,"  said 
Miss  Vane.  "  I  thought  we  had  prospered  up  to  the 
present  point  by  taking  people  out  of  their  places." 

"Yes,  we  have,"  replied  the  minister,  "and  some 
times,  it  seems  to  me,  the  result  is  hideous.  I  don't 
mind  people  taking  themselves  out  of  their  places ; 
but  if  the  particles  of  this  mighty  cosmos  have  been 
adjusted  by  the  divine  wisdom,  what  are  we  to  say 
of  the  temerity  that  disturbs  the  least  of  them  1 " 

"  I  'm  sure  I  don't  know,"  said  Miss  Yane,  rising. 
"I'm  almost  afraid  to  stir,  in  view  of  the  possible 
consequences.  But  I  can't  sit  here  all  day,  and  if 
Mrs.  Sewell  will  excuse  me,  I  '11  go  at  once.  Yes, 

I 1  guess  I  better  be  going,'  as  your  particle  Barker 
says.     Let  us  hope  he  '11  get  safely  back  to  his  infini 
tesimal  little  crevice  in  the  cosmos.     He 's  a  very 
pretty  particle,  don't  you  think  1     That  thick,  coarse, 
wavy  black  hair  growing  in  a  natural  bang  over  his 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.       37 

forehead  would  make  his  fortune  if  he  were  a  certain 
kind  of  young  lady." 

They  followed  her  to  the  door,  chatting,  and 
Sew.ell  looked  quickly  out  when  he  opened  it  for 
her. 

As  she  shook  his  hand  she  broke  into  another 
laugh.  "  Really,  you  looked  as  if  you  were  afraid  of 
finding  him  on  the  steps  !  " 

"If  I  could  only  have  got  near  the  poor  boy," 
said  Sewell  to  his  wife,  as  they  returned  within 
doors.  "If  I  could  only  have  reached  him  where 
he  lives,  as  our  slang  says  !  But  do  what  I  would,  I 
couldn't  find  any  common  ground  where  we  could 
stand  together.  We  were  as  unlike  as  if  we  were  of 
two  different  species.  I  saw  that  everything  I  said 
bewildered  him  more  and  more ;  he  couldn't  under 
stand  me  !  Our  education  is  unchristian,  our  civi 
lisation  is  pagan.  They  both  ought  to  bring  us  in 
closer  relations  with  our  fellow-creatures,  and  they 
both  only  put  us  more  widely  apart !  Every  one  of 
us  dwells  in  an  impenetrable  solitude  !  We  under 
stand  each  other  a  little  if  our  circumstances  are 
similar,  but  if  they  are  different  all  our  words  leave 
us  dumb  and  unintelligible." 


IV. 


BARKER  walked  away  from  the  minister's  door 
without  knowing  where  he  was  going,  and  with  a 
heart  full  of  hot  pain.  He  burned  with  a  confused 
sense  of  shame  and  disappointment  and  anger.  It 
had  turned  out  just  as  his  mother  had  said :  Mr. 
Sewell  would  be  mighty  different  in  Boston  from 
what  he  was  that  day  at  Willoughby  Pastures. 
There  he  made  Barker  think  everything  of  his 
poetry,  and  now  he  pretended  to  tell  him  that  it 
was  not  worth  anything ;  and  he  kept  hinting  round 
that  Barker  had  better  go  back  home  and  stay  there. 
Did  he  think  he  would  have  left  home  if  there  had 
been  anything  for  him  to  do  there  ?  Had  not  he  as 
much  as  told  him  that  he  was  obliged  to  find  some 
thing  to  make  a  living  by,  and  help  the  rest  1  What 
was  he  afraid  of?  Was  he  afraid  that  Barker 
wanted  to  come  and  live  off  him  ?  He  could  show 
him  that  there  was  no  great  danger.  If  he  had 
known  how,  he  would  have  refused  even  to  stay  to 
dinner. 

What  made  him  keep  the  pictures  of  these  people 
who  had  got  along,  if  he  thought  no  one  else  ought 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.       39 

to  try  ?  Barker  guessed  to  himself  that  if  that  Mr. 
Agassiz  had  had  to  get  a  living  off  the  farm  at 
Willoughby  Pastures,  he  would  have  found  time  to 
make  money.  What  did  Mr.  Sewell  mean  by  speak 
ing  of  that  Nilsson  lady  by  her  surname,  without 
any  Miss  or  Mrs.  1  Was  that  the  way  people  talked 
in  Boston  1 

Mr.  Sewell  had  talked  to  him  as  if  he  were  a  baby, 
and  did  not  know  anything ;  and  Barker  was  mad  at 
himself  for  having  stayed  half  a  minute  after  the 
minister  had  owned  up  that  he  had  got  the  letter  he 
wrote  him.  He  wished  he  had  said,  "  Well,  that 's 
all  I  want  of  you,  sir,"  and  walked  right  out ;  but  he 
had  not  known  how  to  do  it.  Did  they  think  it  was 
very  polite  to  go  on  talking  with  that  woman  who 
laughed  so  much,  and  forget  all  about  him  ?  Pretty 
poor  sort  of  manners  to  eat  with  her  bonnet  on,  and 
tell  them  she  hated  their  victuals. 

Barker  tried  to  rage  against  them  in  these  thoughts, 
but  at  the  bottom  of  all  was  a  simple  grief  that  he 
should  have  lost  the  friend  whom  he  thought  he  had 
in  the  minister;  the  friend  he  had  talked  of  and 
dreamed  of  ever  since  he  had  seen  and  heard  him 
speak  those  cordial  words ;  the  friend  he  had  trusted 
through  all,  and  had  come  down  to  Boston  counting 
upon  so  much.  The  tears  came  into  his  eyes  as  he 
stumbled  and  scuffled  along  the  brick  pavements 
with  his  uncouth  country  walk. 

He  was  walking  up  a  straight,  long  street,  with 
houses  just  alike  on  both  sides  and  bits  of  grass 
before  them,  that  sometimes  were  gay  with  late 


40  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

autumn  flowers.  A  horse-car  track  ran  up  the  middle, 
and  the  cars  seemed  to  be  tinkling  by  all  the  time, 
and  people  getting  on  and  off.  They  were  mostly 
ladies  and  children,  and  they  were  very  well  dressed. 
Sometimes  they  stared  at  Barker,  as  they  crossed 
his  way  in  entering  or  issuing  from  the  houses,  but 
generally  no  one  appeared  to  notice  him.  In  some 
of  the  windows  there  were  flowers  in  painted  pots, 
and  in  others  little  marble  images  on  stands. 

There  were  more  images  in  the  garden  that  Barker 
came  to  presently :  an  image  of  Washington  on 
horseback,  and  some  orator  speaking,  with  his  hand 
up,  and  on  top  of  a  monument  a  kind  of  Turk  hold 
ing  up  a  man  that  looked  sick.  The  man  was  almost 
naked,  but  he  was  not  so  bad  as  the  image  of  a 
woman  in  a  granite  basin ;  it  seemed  to  Barker  that 
it  ought  not  to  be  allowed  there.  A  great  many 
people  of  all  kinds  were  passing  through  the  garden, 
and  after  some  hesitation  he  went  in  too,  and  walked 
over  the  bridge  that  crossed  the  pond  in  the  middle 
of  the  garden,  where  there  were  rowboats  and  boats 
with  images  of  swans  on  them.  Barker  made  a 
sarcastic  reflection  that  Boston  seemed  to  be  a  great 
place  for  images,  and  passed  rather  hurriedly  through 
the  garden  on  the  other  side  of  the  bridge.  There 
were  beds  of  all  kinds  of  flowers  scattered  about,  and 
they  were  hardly  touched  by  the  cold  yet.  If  he  had 
been  in  better  heart,  he  would  have  liked  to  look 
round  a  little ;  but  he  felt  strange,  being  there  all 
alone,  and  he  felt  very  low-spirited. 

He  wondered  if  this  were  the  Public  Garden  that 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.   41 

Mrs.  Sewell  had  spoken  of,  and  if  that  kind  of  grove 
across  the  street  were  the  Common.  He  felt  much 
more  ai>  home  in  it,  as  he  wandered  up  and  down  the 
walks,  and  finally  sat  down  on  one  of  the  iron  benches 
beside  the  path.  At  first  he  obscurely  doubted 
whether  he  had  any  right  to  do  so,  unless  he  had  a 
lady  with  him ;  most  of  the  seats  were  occupied  by 
couples  who  seemed  to  be  courting,  but  he  ventured 
finally  to  take  one ;  nobody  disturbed  him,  and  so 
he  remained. 

It  was  a  beautiful  October  afternoon  ;  the  wind, 
warm  and  dry,  caught  the  yellow  leaves  from  the 
trees  overhead  in  little  whiffs,  and  blew  them  about 
the  grass,  which  the  fall  rains  had  made  as  green  as 
May ;  and  a  pensive  golden  light  streamed  through 
the  long  loose  boughs,  and  struck  across  the  slopes 
of  the  Common.  Slight  buggies  flashed  by  on  the 
street  near  which  he  sat,  and  glistening  carriages, 
with  drivers  dressed  out  in  uniform  like  soldiers, 
rumbled  down  its  slope. 

While  he  sat  looking,  now  at  the  street  and  now 
at  the  people  sauntering  and  hurrying  to  and  fro  in 
the  Common,  he  tried  to  decide  a  question  that  had 
mixed  itself  up  with  the  formless  resentment  he  had 
felt  ever  since  Mr.  Sewell  played  him  false.  It  had 
got  out  in  the  neighbourhood  that  he  was  going  to 
Boston  before  he  left  home ;  his  mother  must  have 
told  it ;  and  people  would  think  he  was  to  be  gone 
a  long  time.  He  had  warned  his  mother  that  he 
did  not  know  when  he  should  be  back,  before  he 
started  in  the  morning  ;  and  he  knew  that  she  would 


42  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

repeat  his  words  to  everybody  who  stopped  to  ask 
about  him  during  the  day,  with  what  she  had  said  to 
him  in  reply :  "  You  better  come  home  to-night, 
Lem  ;  and  I  '11  have  ye  a  good  hot  supper  waitin' 
for  ye." 

The  question  was  whether  he  should  go  back  on 
the  five  o'clock  train,  which  would  reach  Willoughby 
Centre  after  dark,  and  house  himself  from  public  igno 
miny  for  one  night  at  least,  or  whether  self-respect  did 
not  demand  that  he  should  stay  in  Boston  for  twenty- 
four  hours  at  any  rate,  and  see  if  something  would 
not  happen.  He  had  now  no  distinct  hope  of  any 
thing  ;  but  his  pride  and  shame  were  holding  him 
fast,  while  the  home-sickness  tugged  at  his  heart,  and 
made  him  almost  forget  the  poverty  that  had  spurred 
him  to  the 'adventure  of  coming  to  Boston.  He 
could  see  the  COWTS  coming  home  through  the  swampy 
meadow  as  plain  as  if  they  were  coming  across  the 
Common  ;  his  mother  was  calling  them  ;  she  and  his 
sister  were  going  to  milk  in  his  absence,  and  he  could 
see  her  now,  how  she  looked  going  out  to  call  the 
cows,  in  her  bare,  grey  head,  gaunt  of  neck  and  cheek, 
in  the  ugly  Bloomer  dress  in  which  she  wras  not 
grotesque  to  his  eyes,  though  it  usually  affected 
strangers  with  stupefaction  or  alarm.  But  it  all 
seemed  far  away,  as  far  as  if  it  were  in  another 
planet  that  he  had  dropped  out  of ;  he  was  divided 
from  it  by  his  failure  and  disgrace.  He  thought  he 
must  stay  and  try  for  something,  he  did  not  know 
what ;  but  he  could  not  make  up  his  mind  to  throw 
away  his  money  for  nothing ;  at  the  hotel,  down  by 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.   43 

the  depot,  where  he  had  left  his  bag,  they  were  going 
to  make  him  pay  fifty  cents  for  just  a  room  alone. 

"  Any  them  beats  'round  here  been  trying  to  come 
their  games  on  you  ?  " 

At  first  Barker  could  not  believe  himself  accosted, 
though  the  young  man  who  spoke  stood  directly  in 
front  of  him,  and  seemed  to  be  speaking  to  him.  He 
looked  up,  and  the  young  man  added/  "  Heigh  ? " 

"  Beats  1  I  don't  know  what  you  mean,"  said 
Barker. 

"  Confidence  sharps,  young  feller.  They  're  'round 
everywheres,  and  don't  you  forget  it.  Move  up  a 
little  ! " 

Barker  was  sitting  in  the  middle  of  the  bench, 
and  at  this  he  pushed  away  from  the  young  man, 
who  had  dropped  himself  sociably  beside  him.  He 
wore  a  pair  of  black  pantaloons,  very  tight  in  the 
legs,  and  widening  at  the  foot  so  as  almost  to  cover 
his  boots.  His  coat  was  deeply  braided,  and  his 
waistcoat  was  cut  low,  so  that  his  plastron-scarf  hung 
out  from  the  shirt-bosom,  which  it  would  have  done 
well  to  cover. 

"  I  tell  you,  Boston  's  full  of  Jem,"  he  said  excitedly. 
"  One  of  'em  come  up  to  me  just  now,  and  says  he, 
'  Seems  to  me  I  've  seen  you  before,  but  I  can't  place 
you.'  '  Oh  yes,'  says  I,  '  I  '11  tell  you  where  it  was. 
I  happened  to  be  in  the  police  court  one  morning 
when  they  was  sendin'  you  up  for  three  months.'  I 
tell  you  he  got  round  the  corner  !  Might  'a'  played 
checkers  on  his  coat  tail.  Why,  what  do  you 
suppose  would  been  the  next  thing  if  I  hadn't  have 


44  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

let  him  know  I  saw  through  him  ?"  demanded  the 
young  man  of  Barker,  who  listened  to  this  adventure 
with  imperfect  intelligence.    "  He  'd  'a'  said,  '  Hain't 
I  seen  you  down  Kennebunk  way  som'eres  1 '      And 
when  I  said,  '  No,  I  'm  from  Leominster  ! '  or  where- 
ever  I  was  from  if  I  was  green,  he  Jd  say,  '  Oh  yes,  so 
it  was  Leominster.    How  '&  the  folks  1  '  and  he  'd  try 
to  get  me  to  tkink  that  he  was  from  Leominster  too ; 
and  then  he  'd  want  me  to  go  off  and  see  the  sights 
with  him ;  and  pretty  soon  he  ;d  meet  a  feller  that 
'ud  dun  him  for  that  money  he  owed  him  ;  and  he  'd 
say  he  hadn't  got  anything  with  him  but  a  cheque  for 
forty  dollars  ;  and  the  other  feller  'd  say  he  'd  got  to 
have  his  money,  and  he  'd  kind  of  insinuate  it  was 
all  a  put-up  job  about  the  cheque  for  forty  dollars, 
anyway;  and  that  'ud  make  the  first  feller  mad,  and 
he  'd  take  out  the  check,  and  ask  him  what  he  thought 
o'  that ;  and  the  other  feller  'd  say,  well,  it  was  a  good 
cheque,  but  it  wan't  money,  and  he  wanted  money ; 
and  then  the  first  feller  'd  say,  'Well,  come  along  to 
the  bank  and  get  your  money,'  and  the  other  'd°say 
the  bank  was  shut.     'Well,  then/  the  first  feller 'd 
say,  'well,  sir,  I  ain't  a-goin'  to  ask  any  favour  of 
you.    ^  How    much    is  your  bill  ?  '   and   the  other 
feller  'd  say  ten  dollars,  or  fifteen,  or  may  be  twenty- 
five,  if  they  thought  I  had  that  much,  and  the  first 
feller  ?d  say,  'Well,  here  's  a  gentleman  from  up  my 
way,  and  I  guess  he  '11  advance  me  that  much  on  my 
cheque  if  I  make  it  worth  his  while.    He  knows  me/ 
And   the  first  thing  you  know— he's  been  treatin' 
you,  and  so  polite,  showin'  you  round,  and  a»t  you 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER,        45 

to  go  to  the  theayter — you  advance  the  money,  and 
you  keep  on  with  the  first  feller,  and  pretty  soon  he 
asks  you  to  hold  up  a  minute,  he  wants  to  go  back 
and  get  a  cigar ;  and  he  goes  round  the  corner,  and 
you  hold  up,  and  hold  up,  and  in  about  a  half  an  hour, 
or  may  be  less  time,  you  begin  to  smell  a  rat,  and 
you  go  for  a  policeman,  and  the  next  morning  you 
find  your  name  in  the  papers,  '  One  more  unfortu 
nate  !'  You  look  out  for  'em.  young  feller  !  Wish  I  had 
let  that  one  go  on  till  he  done  something  so  I  could 
handed  him  over  to  the  cops.  It 's  a  shame  they  Jre 
allowed  to  go  'round,  when  the  cops  knows  'em. 
Hello  !  There  comes  my  mate,  now."  The  young 
man  spoke  as  if  they  had  been  talking  of  his  mate 
and  expecting  him,  and  another  young  man,  his 
counterpart  in  dress,  but  of  a  sullen  and  heavy  de 
meanour  very  unlike  his  own  brisk  excitement, 
approached,  flapping  a  bank-note  in  his  hand.  "  I 
just  been  tellin'  this  young  feller  about  that  beat, 
you  know." 

"  Oh,  he  's  all  right,"  said  the  mate.  "  Just  seen 
him  down  on  Tremont  Street,  between  two  cops. 
Must  ha'  caught  him  in  the  act." 

"  You  don't  say  so  !  Well,  that 's  good,  anyway. 
Why  !  didn't  you  get  it  changed  1 "  demanded  the 
young  man  with  painful  surprise  as  his  mate  handed 
him  the  bank-note. 

"  No,  I  didn't.  I  been  to  more  'n  twenty  places, 
and  there  ain't  no  small  bills  nowhere.  The  last 
place,  I  offered  'em  twenty-five  cents  if  they  'd  change 
it." 


46  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"  Why  didn't  you  offer  'em  fifty  ?  I  'd  V  give  fifty, 
and  glad  to  do  it.  Why,  I  Ve  got  to  have  this  bill 
changed." 

"  Well,  I  'm  sorry  for  you,"  said  the  mate,  with 
ironical  sympathy,  "  because  I  don't  see  how  you  're 
goin'  to  git  it  done.  Won't  you  move  up  a  little  bit, 
young  feller  ?  "  He  sat  down  on  the  other  side  of 
Barker.  "  I  'm  about  tired  out."  He  took  his  head 
between  his  hands  in  sign  of  extreme  fatigue,  and 
drooped  forward,  with  his  eyes  fixed  on  the  ground. 

Lemuel's  heart  beat.  Fifty  cents  would  pay  for 
his  lodging,  and  he  could  stay  till  the  next  day  and 
prolong  the  chance  of  something  turning  up  without 
too  sinful  a  waste  of  money. 

"  How  much  is  the  bill  ?  "  he  asked. 

"  Ten  dollars,"  said  the  young  man  despondently. 

"And  will  you  give  me  fifty  cents  if  I  change  it  1" 

"  Well,  I  said  I  'd  give  fifty  cents,"  replied  the  young 
man  gloomily,  "  and  I  will." 

"  It 's  a  bargain,"  said  Lemuel  promptly,  and  he 
took  from  his  pocket  the  two  five-dollar  notes  that 
formed  his  store,  and  gave  them  to  the  young  man. 

He  looked  at  them  critically.  "  How  do  I  know 
they're  good?"  he  asked.  "You're  a  stranger  to 
me,  young  feller,  and  how  do  I  know  you  ain't  tryin' 
to  beat  me  V  He  looked  sternly  at  Lemuel,  but  here 
the  mate  interposed. 

"  How  does  he  know  that  you  ain't  tryin'  to  beat 
him  ?  "  he  asked  contemptuously.  "  I  never  saw  such 
a  feller  as  you  are  1  Here  you  make  me  run  half 
over  town  to  change  that  bill,  and  now  when  a 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.    47 

gentleman  offers  to  break  it  for  you,  you  have  to  go 
and  accuse  him  of  tryin'  to  put  off  counterfeit  money 
on  you.  If  I  was  him  I  'd  see  you  furder." 

"Oh,  well,  I  don't  want  any  words  about  it. 
Here,  take  your  money,"  said  the  young  man.  "As 
long  as  I  said  I  'd  do  it,  I  '11  do  it.  Here 's  your 
half  a  dollar."  He  put  it,  with  the  bank-note,  into 
Lemuel's  hand,  and  rose  briskly.  "  You  stay  here, 
Jimmy,  till  I  come  back.  I  won't  be  gone  a 
minute." 

He  walked  down  the  mall,  and  went  out  of  the 
gate  on  Tremont  Street.  Then  the  mate  came  to 
himself.  "  Why,  I  've  let  him  go  off  with  both  them 
bills  now,  and  he  owes  me  one  of  'em."  With  that 
he  rose  from  Lemuel's  side  and  hurried  after  his 
vanishing  comrade  ;  before  he  was  out  of  sight  he 
had  broken  into  a  run. 

Lemuel  sat  looking  after  them,  his  satisfaction  in 
the  affair  alloyed  by  dislike  of  the  haste  with  which 
it  had  been  transacted.  His  rustic  mind  worked 
slowly  •  it  was  not  wholly  content  even  with  a  result 
in  its  own  favour,  where  tiie  process  had  been  so 
rapid  ;  he  was  scarcely  able  to  fix  the  point  at 
which  the  talk  ceased  to  be  a  warning  against  beats 
and  became  his  opportunity  for  speculation.  He 
did  not  feel  quite  right  at  having  taken  the  fellow's 
half-dollar ;  and  yet  a  bargain  was  a  bargain. 
Nevertheless,  if  the  fellow  wanted  to  rue  it, 
Lemuel  would  give  him  fifteen  minutes  to  come 
back  and  get  his  money  ;  and  he  sat  for  that  space 
of  time  where  the  others  had  left  him.  He  was  not 


48  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

going  to  be  mean ;  and  he  might  have  waited  a 
little  longer  if  it  had  not  been  for  the  behaviour  of 
two  girls  who  came  up  and  sat  down  on  the  same 
bench  with  him.  They  could  not  have  been  above 
fifteen  or  sixteen  years  old,  and  Lemuel  thought  they 
were  very  pretty,  but  they  talked  so,  and  laughed  so 
loud,  and  scuffled  with  each  other  for  the  paper  of 
chocolate  which  one  of  them  took  out  of  her  pocket, 
that  Lemuel,  after  first  being  abashed  by  the  fact 
that  they  were  city  girls,  became  disgusted  with  them. 
He  was  a  stickler  for  propriety  of  behaviour  among 
girls ;  his  mother  had  taught  him  to  despise  any 
thing  like  carrying  on  among  them,  and  at  twenty 
he  was  as  severely  virginal  in  his  morality  as  if  he 
had  been  twelve. 

People  looked  back  at  these  tomboys  when  they 
had  got  by ;  and  some  shabby  young  fellows  ex 
changed  saucy  speeches  with  them.  When  Lemuel 
got  up  and  walked  away  in  reproving  dignity,  one  of 
the  hoydens  bounced  into  his  place,  and  they  both 
sent  a  cry  of  derision  after  him.  But  Lemuel  would 
not  give  them  the  satisfaction  of  letting  them  know 
that  he  heard  them,  and  at  the  same  time  he  was  not 
going  to  let  them  suppose  that  they  had  driven  him 
away.  He  went  very  slowly  down  to  the  street 
where  a  great  many  horse-cars  were  passing  to  and 
fro,  and  waited  for  one  marked  "  Fitchburg,  Lowell, 
and  Eastern  Depots."  He  was  not  going  to  take  it ; 
but  he  meant  to  follow  it  on  its  way  to  those 
stations,  in  the  neighbourhood  of  which  was  the  hotel 
where  he  had  left  his  travelling-bag.  He  had  told 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.        49 

them  that  he  might  take  a  room  there,  or  he  might 
not ;  now  since  he  had  this  half-dollar  extra  he 
thought  that  he  would  stay  for  the  night ;  it 
probably  would  not  be  any  cheaper  at  the  other 
hotels. 

He  ran  against  a  good  many  people  in  trying  to 
keep  the  car  in  sight,  but  by  leaving  the  sidewalk 
from  time*  to  time  where  it  was  most  crowded,  he 
managed  not  to  fall  very  much  behind  ;  the  worst 
was  that  the  track  went  crooking  and  turning  about 
so  much  in  different  streets,  that  he  began  to  lose 
faith  in  its  direction,  and  to  be  afraid,  in  spite  of  the 
sign  on  its  side,  that  the  car  was  not  going  to  the  de 
pots  after  all.  But  it  came  in  sight  of  them  at  last, 
and  then  Lemuel,  blown  with  the  chase  but  secure  of 
his  ground,  stopped  and  rested  himself  against  the 
side  of  a  wall  to  get  his  breath.  The  pursuit  had 
been  very  exhausting,  and  at  times  it  had  been 
mortifying ;  for  here  and  there  people  who  saw  him 
running  after  the  car  had  supposed  he  wished  to 
board  it,  and  in  their  good-nature  had  hailed  and 
stopped  it.  After  this  had  happened  twice  or  thrice, 
Lemuel  perceived  that  he  was  an  object  of  contempt 
to  the  passengers  in  the  car ;  but  he  did  not  know 
what  to  do  about  it ;  he  was  not  going  to  pay  six 
cents  to  ride  when  he  could  just  as  well  walk,  and 
on  the  other  hand  he  dared  not  lose  sight  of  the  car, 
for  he  had  no  other  means  of  finding  his  way  back 
to  his  hotel. 

But  he  was  all  right  now,  as  he  leaned  against  the 
house-wall,  panting,  and  mopping  his  forehead  with 
D 


50  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

his  handkerchief  ;  he  saw  his  hotel  a  little  way  down 
the  street,  and  he  did  not  feel  anxious  about  it. 

"Gave  you  the  slip  after  all,"  said  a  passer,  who 
had  apparently  been  interested  in  Lemuel's  adven 
ture. 

"  Oh,  I  didn't  want  to  catch  it,"  said  Lemuel. 

"  Ah,  merely  fond  of  exercise,"  said  the  stranger. 
"  Well,  it 's  a  very  good  thing,  if  you  don't  overdo  it." 
He  walked  by,  and  then  after  a  glance  at  Lemuel 
over  his  shoulder,  he  returned  to  him.  "  May  I  ask 
why  you  wanted  to  chase  the  car,  if  you  didn't  want 
to  catch  it  ? " 

Lemuel  hesitated ;  he  did  not  like  to  confide  in 
a  total  stranger;  this  gentleman  looked  kind  and 
friendly,  but  he  was  all  the  more  likely  on  that 
account  to  be  a  beat ;  the  expression  was  probably 
such  as  a  beat  would  put  on  in  approaching  his 
intended  prey.  "Oh,  nothing,"  said  Lemuel  eva 
sively. 

"I  beg  your  pardon,"  said  the  stranger,  and  he 
walked  away  \vith  what  Lemuel  could  only  conjecture 
was  the  air  of  a  baffled  beat. 

He  waited  till  he  was  safely  out  of  sight,  and  then 
followed  on  down  the  street  towards  his  hotel. 
When  he  reached  it  he  walked  boldly  up  to  the  clerk's 
desk,  and  said  that  he  guessed  he  would  take  a  room 
for  the  night,  and  gave  him  the  check  for  his  bag 
that  he  had  received  in  leaving  it  there. 

The  clerk  wrote  the  number  of  a  room  against 
Lemuel's  name  in  the  register,  and  then  glanced  at 
the  bag.  It  was  a  large  bag  of  oil-cloth,  a  kind  of 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.        51 

bag  which  is  by  nature  lank  and  hollow,  and  must  be 
made  almost  insupportably  heavy  before  it  shows  any 
signs  of  repletion.  The  shirt  and  pair  of  everyday 
pantaloons  which  Lemuel  had  dropped  that  morning 
into  its  voracious  maw  made  no  apparent  effect  there, 
as  the  clerk  held  it  up  and  twirled  it  on  the  crook 
of  his  thumb. 

"  I  guess  I  shall  have  to  get  the  money  for  that 
room  in  advance,"  he  said,  regarding  the  bag  very 
critically.  However  he  might  have  been  wounded 
by  the  doubt  of  his  honesty  or  his  solvency  implied 
in  this  speech,  Lemuel  said  nothing,  but  took  out 
his  ten-dollar  note  and  handed  it  to  the  clerk.  The 
latter  said  apologetically,  "  It 's  one  of  our  rules, 
where  there  isn't  baggage,"  and  then  glancing  at  the 
note  he  flung  it  quickly  across  the  counter  to  Lemuel. 
"That  won't  do!" 

"  Won't  do  ?  "  repeated  Lemuel,  taking  up  the 
bill. 

"  Counterfeit,"  said  the  clerk. 


V. 


LEMUEL  stretched  the  note  between  his  hands, 
and  pored  so  long  upon  it  that  the  clerk  began  to 
tap  impatiently  with  his  finger-tips  on  the  register. 
*'  It  won't  go  1 "  faltered  the  boy,  looking  up  at  the 
clerk's  sharp  face. 

'•  It  won't  go  here,"  replied  the  clerk.  "  Got  any 
thing  else  1  " 

Lemuel's  head  whirled ;  the  air  seemed  to  darken 
around  him,  as  he  pored  again  upon  the  note,  and 
turned  it  over  and  over.  Two  tears  scalded  their 
way  down  his  cheeks,  and  his  lips  twitched,  when 
the  clerk  added,  "  Some  beats  been  workin'  you  ]  " 
but  he  made  no  answer.  His  heart  was  hot  with 
shame  and  rage,  and  heavy  with  despair.  He  put 
the  note  in  his  pocket,  and  took  his  bag  and  walked 
out  of  the  hotel.  He  had  not  money  enough  to  get 
home  with  now,  and  besides  he  could  not  bear  to  go 
back  in  the  disgrace  of  such  calamity.  It  would  be 
all  over  the  neighbourhood,  as  soon  as  his  mother 
could  tell  it ;  she  might  wish  to  keep  it  to  herself 
for  his  sake,  but  she  could  not  help  telling  it  to  the 
first  person  and  every  person  she  saw;  she  would 

52 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.       53 

have  to  go  over  to  the  neighbours  to  tell  it.  In  a 
dreary,  homesick  longing  he  saw  her  crossing  the 
familiar  meadows  that  lay  between  the  houses,  bare 
headed,  in  her  apron,  her  face  set  and  rigid  with 
wonder  at  what  had  happened  to  her  Lem.  He 
could  not  bear  the  thought.  He  would  rather  die  ; 
he  would  rather  go  to  sea.  This  idea  flashed  into 
his  mind  as  he  lifted  his  eyes  aimlessly  and  caught 
sight  of  the  tall  masts  of  the  coal-ships  lying  at  the 
railroad  wharves,  and  he  walked  quickly  in  the 
direction  of  them,  so  as  not  to  give  himself  time  to 
think  about  it,  so  as  to  do  it  now,  quick,  right  off. 
But  he  found  his  way  impeded  by  all  sorts  of 
obstacles ;  a  gate  closed  across  the  street  to  let  some 
trains  draw  in  and  out  of  a  station ;  then  a  lot  of 
string  teams  and  slow,  heavy-laden  trucks  got  before 
him,  with  a  turmoil  of  express  wagons,  herdics,  and 
hacks,  in  which  he  was  near  being  run  over,  and  was 
yelled  at,  sworn  at,  and  laughed  at  as  he  stood 
bewildered,  with  his  lank  bag  in  his  hand.  He 
turned  and  walked  back  past  the  hotel  again.  He 
felt  it  an  escape,  after  all,  not  to  have  gone  to  sea ; 
and  now  a  hopeful  thought  struck  him.  He  would 
go  back  to  the  Common  and  Avatch  for  those  fellows 
who  fooled  him,  and  set  the  police  on  them,  and  get 
his  money  from  them ;  they  might  come  prowling 
round  again  to  fool  somebody  else.  He  looked  out 
for  a  car  marked  like  the  one  he  had  followed  down 
from  the  Common,  and  began  to  follow  it  on  its 
return.  He  got  ahead  of  the  car  whenever  it  stopped, 
so  as  to  be  spared  the  shame  of  being  seen  to  chase 


54  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

it ;  and  he  managed  to  keep  it  in  sight  till  he  reached 
the  Common.  There  he  walked  about  looking  for 
those  scamps,  and  getting  pushed  and  hustled  by  the 
people  who  now  thronged  the  paths.  At  last  he  was 
tired  out,  and  on  the  Beacon  Street  mall,  where  he 
had  first  seen  those  fellows,  he  found  the  very  seat 
where  they  had  all  sat  together,  and  sank  into  it. 
The  seats  were  mostly  vacant  now ;  a  few  persons 
sat  there  reading  their  evening  papers.  As  the  light 
began  to  wane,  they  folded  up  their  papers  and 
walked  away,  and  their  places  were  filled  by  young 
men,  who  at  once  put  their  arms  round  the  young 
women  with  them,  and  seemed  to  be  courting.  They 
did  not  say  much,  if  anything ;  they  just  sat  there. 
It  made  Lemuel  ashamed  to  look  at  them;  he 
thought  they  ought  to  have  more  sense.  He  looked 
away,  but  he  could  not  look  away  from  them  all, 
there  were  so  many  of  them.  He  was  all  the  time 
very  hungry,  but  he  thought  he  ought  not  to  break 
into  his  half-dollar  as  long  as  he  could  help  it,  or  till 
there  was  no  chance  left  of  catching  those  fellows. 
The  night  came  on,  the  gas-lamps  were  lighted,  and 
some  lights  higher  up,  like  moonlight  off'  on  the 
other  paths,  projected  long  glares  into  the  night  and 
made  the  gas  look  sickly  and  yellow.  Sitting  still 
there  while  it  grew  later,  he  did  not  feel  quite  so 
hungry,  but  he  felt  more  tired  than  ever.  There 
were  not  so  many  people  around  now,  and  he  did  not 
see  why  he  should  not  lie  down  on  that  seat  and  rest 
himself  a  little.  He  made  feints  of  reclining  on  his 
arm  at  first,  to  see  if  he  were  noticed;  then  he 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.       55 

stretched  himself  out,  with  his  bag  under  his  head, 
and  his  hands  in  his  pockets  clutching  the  money 
which  he  meant  to  make  those  fellows  take  back. 
He  got  a  gas-lamp  in  range,  to  keep  him  awake,  and 
lay  squinting  his  eyes  to  meet  the  path  of  rays 
running  down  from  it  to  him.  Then  he  shivered, 
and  rose  up  with  a  sudden  start.  The  dull,  rich 
dawn  was  hanging  under  the  trees  around  him,  while 
the  electric  lamps,  like  paler  moons  now,  still  burned 
among  their  tops.  The  sparrows  bickered  on  the 
grass  and  the  gravel  of  the  path  around  him. 

He  could  not  tell  where  he  was  at  first ;  but 
presently  he  remembered,  and  looked  for  his  bag. 
It  was  gone  ;  and  the  money  was  gone  out  of  both 
his  pockets.  He  dropped  back  upon  the  seat,  and 
leaning  his  head  against  the  back,  he  began  to  cry 
for  utter  despair.  He  had  hardly  ever  cried  since  he 
was  a  baby ;  and  he  would  not  have  done  it  now, 
but  there  was  no  one  there  to  see  him. 

When  he  had  his  cry  out  he  felt  a  little  better, 
and  he  got  up  and  went  to  the  pond  in  the  hollow, 
and  washed  his  hands  and  face,  and  wiped  them  on 
the  handkerchief  his  mother  had  ironed  for  him  to 
use  at  the  minister's ;  it  was  still  in  the  folds  she 
had  given  it.  As  he  shook  it  out,  rising  up,  he  saw 
that  people  were  asleep  on  all  the  benches  round  the 
pond  ;  he  looked  hopelessly  at  them  to  see  if  any  of 
them  were  those  fellows,  but  he  could  not  find  them. 
He  seemed  to  be  the  only  person  awake  on  the 
Common,  and  wandered  out  of  it  and  down  through 
the  empty  streets,  filled  at  times  with  the  moony 


56  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

light  of  the  waning  electrics,  and  at  times  merely 
with  the  grey  dawn.  A  man  came  along  putting 
out  the  gas,  and  some  milk-carts  rattled  over  the 
pavement.  By  and  by  a  market-wagon,  with  the 
leaves  and  roots  of  cabbages  sticking  out  from  the 
edges  of  the  canvas  that  covered  it,  came  by,  and 
Lemuel  followed  it ;  he  did  not  know  what  else  to 
do,  and  it  went  so  slow  that  he  could  keep  up, 
though  the  famine  that  gnawed  within  him  was  so 
sharp  sometimes  that  he  felt  as  if  he  must  fall  down. 
He  was  going  to  drop  into  a  doorway  and  rest,  but 
when  he  came  to  it  he  found  on  an  upper  step  a  man 
folded  forward  like  a  limp  bundle,  snoring  in  a  fetid, 
sodden  sleep,  and,  shocked  into  new  strength,  he 
hurried  on.  At  last  the  wagon  came  to  a  place  that 
he  saw  was  a  market.  There  were  no  buyers  yet, 
but  men  were  flitting  round  under  the  long  arcades 
of  the  market-houses,  with  lanterns  under  their  arms, 
among  boxes  and  barrels  of  melons,  apples,  potatoes, 
onions,  beans,  carrots,  and  other  vegetables,  which 
the  country  carts  as  they  arrived  continually  unloaded. 
The  smell  of  peaches  and  cantaloupes  filled  the  air, 
and  made  Lemuel  giddy  as  he  stood  and  looked  at 
the  abundance.  The  men  were  not  saying  much; 
now  and  then  one  of  them  priced  something,  the 
owner  pretended  to  figure  on  it,  and  then  they  fell 
into  a  playful  scuffle,  but  all  silently.  A  black  cat 
lay  luxuriously  asleep  on  the  canvas  top  of  a  barrel 
of  melons,  and  the  man  who  priced  the  melons  asked 
if  the  owner  would  throw  the  cat  in.  There  was  a 
butcher's  cart  laden  with  carcasses  of  sheep,  and  one 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.   57 

of  the  men  asked  the  butcher  if  he  called  that  stuff 
mutton.  "  No  ;  imitation,"  said  the  butcher.  They 
all  seemed  to  be  very  good-natured.  Lemuel  thought 
he  would  ask  for  an  apple ;  but  he  could  not. 

The  neighbouring  restaurants  began  to  send  forth 
the  smell  of  breakfast,  and  he  dragged  up  and  down 
till  he  could  bear  it  no  longer,  and  then  went  into 
one  of  them,  meaning  to  ask  for  some  job  by  which 
he  could  pay  for  a  meal.  But  his  shame  again 
would  not  let  him.  He  looked  at  the  fat,  white- 
aproned  boy  drawing  coffee  hot  from  a  huge  urn,  and 
serving  a  countryman  with  a  beefsteak.  It  w~as  close 
and  sultry  in  there ;  the  open  sugar-bowl  was  black 
with  flies,  and  a  scent  of  decaying  meat  came  from 
the  next  cellar.  "  Like  some  nice  fresh  dough-nuts  1 " 
said  the  boy  to  Lemuel.  He  did  not  answer ;  he 
looked  around  as  if  he  had  come  in  search  of  some 
one.  Then  he  went  out,  and  straying  away  from  the 
market,  he  found  himself  after  a  while  in  a  street 
that  opened  upon  the  Common. 

He  was  glad  to  sit  down,  and  he  said  to  himself 
that  now  he  would  stay  there,  and  keep  a  good  look 
out  for  the  chaps  that  had  robbed  him.  But  again 
he  fell  asleep,  and  he  did  not  wake  now  till  the  sun 
was  high,  and  the  paths  of  the  Common  were  filled 
with  hurrying  people.  He  sat  where  he  had  slept, 
for  he  did  not  know  what  else  to  do  or  where  to  go. 
Sometimes  he  thought  he  would  go  to  Mr.  Sewell, 
and  ask  him  for  money  enough  to  get  home ;  but 
he  could  not  do  it ;  he  could  moTe  easily  starve. 

After  an  hour  or  two  he  went  to  get  a  drink  at  a 


58  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

fountain  he  saw  a  little  way  off,  and  when  he  came 
back  some  people  had  got  his  seat.  He  started  to 
look  for  another,  and  on  his  way  he  found  a  cent  in 
the  path,  and  he  bought  an  apple  with  it — a  small 
one  that  the  dealer  especially  picked  out  for  cheap 
ness.  It  seemed  pretty  queer  to  Lemuel  that  a 
person  should  want  anything  for  one  apple.  The 
apple  when  he  ate  it  made  him  sick.  His  head 
began  to  ache,  and  it  ached  all  day.  Late  in  the 
afternoon  he  caught  sight  of  one  of  those  fellows 
at  a  distance ;  but  there  was  no  policeman  near. 
Lemuel  called  out,  "  Stop  there,  you ! "  but  the 
fellow  began  to  run  when  he  recognised  Lemuel, 
and  the  boy  was  too  weak  and  faint  to  run  after  him. 

The  day  wore  away  and  the  evening  came  again, 
and  he  had  been  twenty-four  hours  houseless  and 
without  food.  He  must  do  something  ;  he  could  not 
stand  it  any  longer ;  there  was  no  sense  in  it.  He 
had  read  in  the  newspapers  how  they  gave  soup  at 
the  police-stations  in  Boston  in  the  winter ;  perhaps 
they  gave  something  in  summer.  He  mustered  up 
courage  to  ask  a  gentleman  who  passed  where  the 
nearest  station  was,  and  then  started  in  search  of  it. 
If  the  city  gave  it,  then  there  was  no  disgrace  in  it, 
and  Lemuel  had  as  much  right  to  anything  that  was 
going  as  other  people ;  that  was  the  way  he  silenced 
his  pride. 

But  he  missed  the  place  ;  he  must  have  gone  down 
the  wrong  street  from  Tremont  to  Washington  ;  the 
gentleman  had  said  the  street  that  ran  along  the 
Common  was  Tremont,  and  the  next  was  Washington. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.       59 

The  cross-street  that  Lemuel  got  into  was  filled  with 
people,  going  and  coming,  and  lounging  about.  There 
were  girls  going  along  two  or  three  together  with 
books  under  their  arms,  and  other  girls  talking  with 
young  fellows  who  hung  about  the  doors  of  brightly 
lighted  shops,  and  flirting  with  them,  One  of  the 
girls,  whom  he  had  seen  the  day  before  in  the 
Common,  turned  upon  Lemuel  as  he  passed,  and 
said,  "There  goes  my  young  man  now!  Good 
evening,  Johnny  !  "  It  made  Lemuel's  cheek  burn  ; 
he  would  have  liked  to  box  her  ears  for  her.  The 
fellows  all  set  up  a  laugh. 

Towards  the  end  of  the  street  the  crowd  thickened, 
and  there  the  mixture  of  gas  and  the  white  moony 
lights  that  glared  higher  up,  and  winked  and  hissed, 
shone  upon  the  faces  of  'a  throng  that  had  gathered 
about  the  doors  and  windows  of  a  store  a  little  way 
down  the  other  street.  Lemuel  joined  them,  and 
for  pure  listlessness  waited  round  to  see  what  they 
were  looking  at.  By  and  by  he  was  worked  inward 
by  the  shifting  and  changing  of  the  crowd,  and  found 
himself  looking  in  at  the  door  of  a  room,  splendidly 
fitted  up  with  mirrors  and  marble  everywhere,  and 
coloured  glass  and  carved  mahogany.  There  was  a 
long  counter  with  three  men  behind  it,  and  over  their 
heads  was  a  large  painting  of  a  woman,  worse  than 
that  image  in  the  garden.  The  men  were  serving 
out  liquor  to  the  people  that  stood  around  drinking 
and  smoking,  and  battening  on  this  picture.  Lemuel 
could  not  help  looking,  either.  "  What  place  is 
this  ] "  he  asked  of  the  boy  next  him. 


60  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"  Why,  don't  you  know  ?  "  said  the  boy.  "  It 's 
Jimmy  Baker's.  Just  opened." 

"  Oh,"  said  Lemuel.  He  was  not  going  to  let  the 
boy  see  that  he  did  not  know  who  Jimmy  Baker 
was.  Just  then  something  caught  his  eye  that  had  a 
more  powerful  charm  for  him  than  that  painting.  It 
was  a  large  bowl  at  the  end  of  the  counter,  which  had 
broken  crackers  in  it,  and  near  it  were  two  plates, 
one  with  cheese,  and  one  with  bits  of  dried  fish  and 
smoked  meat.  The  sight  made  the  water  come  into 
his  mouth ;  he  watched  like  a  hungry  dog,  with  a 
sympathetic  working  of  the  jaws,  the  men  who  took 
a  bit  of  fish,  or  meat,  or  cheese,  and  a  cracker,  or  all 
four  of  them,  before  or  after  they  drank.  Presently 
one  of  the  crowd  near  him  walked  in  and  took  some 
fish  and  cracker  without  drinking  at  all ;  he  merely 
winked  at  one  of  the  bar-tenders,  who  winked  at  him 
in  return. 

A  tremendous  tide  of  daring  rose  in  Lemuel's 
breast.  He  was  just  going  to  go  in  and  risk  the 
same  thing  himself,  when  a  voice  in  the  crowd 
behind  him  said,  "Hain't  you  had  'most  enough, 
young  feller?  Some  the  rest  of  us  would  like  a 
chance  to  see  now." 

Lemuel  knew  the  voice,  and  turning  quickly,  he 
knew  the  impudent  face  it  belonged  to.  He  did 
not  mind  the  laugh  raised  at  his  expense,  but 
launched  himself  across  the  intervening  spectators, 
and  tried  to  seize  the  scamp  who  had  got  his  money 
from  him.  The  scamp  had  recognised  Lemuel  too, 
and  he  fell  back  beyond  his  grasp,  and  then  lunged 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.        61 

through  the  crowd,  and  tore  round  the  corner  and 
up  the  street.  Lemuel  followed  as  fast  as  he  could. 
In  spite  of  the  weakness  he  had  felt  before,  wrath 
and  the  sense  of  wrong  lent  him  speed,  and  he  was 
gaining  in  the  chase  when  he  heard  a  girl's  voice, 
"  There  goes  one  of  them  now  ! "  and  then  a  man 
seemed  to  be  calling  after  him,  "  Stop,  there  !  "  He 
turned  round,  and  a  policeman,  looking  gigantic  in 
his  belted  blue  flannel  blouse  and  his  straw  helmet, 
bore  down  upon  the  country  boy  with  his  club  drawn, 
and  seized  him  by  the  collar. 

"You  come  along,"  he  said. 

.  "I  haven't  done  anything,'5  said  Lemuel,  sub 
mitting,  as  he  must,  and  in  his  surprise  and  terror 
losing  the  strength  his  wrath  had  given  him.  He 
could  scarcely  drag  his  feet  over  the  pavement,  and 
the  policeman  had  almost  to  carry  him  at  arm's 
length. 

A  crowd  had  gathered  about  them,  and  was  follow 
ing  Lemuel  and  his  captor,  but  they  fell  back  when 
they  reached  the  steps  of  the  police-station,  and 
Lemuel  was  pulled  up  alone,  and  pushed  in  at  the 
door.  He  was  pushed  through  another  door,  and 
found  himself  in  a  kind  of  office.  A  stout  man  in 
his  shirt-sleeves  was  sitting  behind  a  desk  within  a 
railing,  and  a  large  book  lay  open  on  the  desk.  This 
man,  whose  blue  waistcoat  with  brass  buttons  marked 
him  for  some  sort  of  officer,  looked  impersonally  at 
Lemuel  and  then  at  the  officer,  while  he  chewed  a 
quill  toothpick,  rolling  it  in  his  lips.  "  What  have 
you  got  there  1 "  he  asked. 


62  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"  Assaulting  a  girl  down  here,  and  grabbing  her 
satchel,"  said  the  officer  who  had  arrested  Lemuel, 
releasing  his  collar  and  going  to  the  door,  whence  he 
called,  "You  come  in  here,  lady,"  and  a  young  girl, 
her  face  red  with  weeping  and  her  hair  disordered, 
came  back  with  him.  She  held  a  crumpled  straw 
hat  with  the  brim  torn  loose,  and  in  spite  of  her 
disordered  looks  she  was  very  pretty,  with  blue  eyes 
flung  very  wide  open,  and  rough  brown  hair,  wavy 
and  cut  short,  almost  like  a  boy's.  This  Lemuel  saw 
in  the  frightened  glance  they  exchanged. 

"  This  the  fellow  that  assaulted  you  1 "  asked  the 
man  at  the  desk,  nodding  his  head  toward  Lemuel, 
who  tried  to  speak  ;  but  it  was  like  a  nightmare ;  he 
could  not  make  any  sound. 

"There  were  three  of  them,"  said  the  girl  with 
hysterical  volubility.  "  One  of  them  pulled  my  hat 
down  over  my  eyes  and  tore  it,  and  one  of  them 
held  me  by  the  elbows  behind,  and  they  grabbed 
my  satchel  away  that  had  a  book  in  it  that  I  had 
just  got  out  of  the  library.  I  hadn't  got  it  more 
than " 

"  What  name  ?  "  asked  the  man  at  the  desk. 

"A  Young  Man's  Darling"  said  the  girl,  after 
a  bashful  hesitation.  Lemuel  had  read  that  book 
just  before  he  left  home ;  he  had  not  thought  it  was 
much  of  a  book. 

"  The  captain  wants  to  know  your  name,"  said  the 
officer  in  charge  of  Lemuel. 

"  Oh,"  said  the  girl,  with  mortification.  "  Statira 
Dudley." 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.        63 

"  What  age  1 "  asked  the  captain. 

"  Nineteen  last  June,"  replied  the  girl  with  eager 
promptness,  that  must  have  come  from  shame  from 
the  blunder  she  had  made.  Lemuel  was  twenty, 
the  4th  of  July. 

"Weight  1 "  pursued  the  captain. 

"  Well,  I  hain't  been  weighed  very  lately,"  answered 
the  girl,  with  increasing  interest.  "  I  don't  know  as 
I  been  weighed  since  I  left  home." 

The  captain  looked  at  her  judicially. 

"  That  so  1  Well,  you  look  pretty  solid.  Guess 
I  '11  put  you  down  at  a  hundred  and  twenty." 

"  Well,  I  guess  it 's  full  as  much  as  that,"  said  the 
girl,  writh  a  flattered  laugh. 

"  Dunno  how  high  you  are  1 "  suggested  the  captain, 
glancing  at  her  again. 

"  Well,  yes,  I  do.  I  am  just  five  feet  two  inches 
and  a  half." 

"You  don't  look  it,"  said  the  captain  critically. 

"Well,  I  am,"  insisted  the  girl,  with  a  returning 
gaiety. 

The  captain  apparently  checked  himself  and  put 
on  a  professional  severity. 

"What  business — occupation  ? " 

"  Sales-lady,"  said  the  girl. 

"Kesidence?" 

"  No.  2334  Pleasant  Avenue." 

The  captain  leaned  back  in  his  arm-chair,  and 
turned  his  toothpick  between  his  lips,  as  he  stared 
hard  at  the  girl. 

"Well,  now,"  he  said,  after  a  moment,  "you  know 


64  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

you  Ve  got  to  come  into  court  and  testify  to-morrow 
morning." 

"  Yes/'  said  the  girl,  rather  falteringly,  with  a 
sidelong  glance  at  Lemuel. 

"You've  got  to  promise  to  do  it,  or  else  it  will  be 
my  duty  to  have  you  locked  up  overnight." 

"  Have  me  locked  up  ?  "  gasped  the  girl,  her  wide 
blue  eyes  filling  with  astonishment. 

"Detain  you  as  a  witness,"  the  captain  explained. 
"Of  course,  we  shouldn't  put  you  in  a  cell;  we 
should  give  you  a  good  room,  and  if  you  ain't  sure 
you  '11  appear  in  the  morning " 

The  girl  was  not  of  the  sort  whose  tongues  are 
paralysed  by  terror.  "  Oh,  I  '11  be  sure  to  appear, 
captain !  Indeed  I  will,  captain !  You  needn't 
lock  me  up,  captain  !  Lock  me  up  !  "  she  broke  off 
indignantly.  "It  would  be  a  pretty  idea  if  I  was 
first  to  be  robbed  of  my  satchel  and  then  put  in 
prison  for  it  overnight !  A  great  kind  of  law  that 
would  be  !  Why,  I  never  heard  of  such  a  thing  ! 
I  think  it 's  a  perfect  shame  !  I  want  to  know  if 
that 's  the  way  you  do  with  poor  things  that  you 
don't  know  about  ?  " 

"  That 's  about  the  size  of  it,"  said  the  captain, 
permitting  himself  a  smile,  in  which  the  officer 
joined. 

"  Well,  it 's  a  shame  !  "  cried  the  girl,  now  carried 
far  beyond  her  personal  interest  in  the  matter. 

The  captain  laughed  outright.  "It  is  pretty 
rough.  But  what  you  going  to  do  1 '"' 

"  Do  1     Why,  I'd "     But  here  she  stopped 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.        65 

for  want  of  science,  and  added  from  emotion,  "  I  'd 
do  anything  before  I  'd  do  that." 

"Well,"  said  the  captain,  "then  I  understand 
you  '11  come  round  to  the  police  court  and  give  your 
testimony  in  the  morning  f( " 

"  Yes,"  said  the  girl,  with  a  vague,  compassionate 
glance  at  Lemuel,  who  had  stood  there  dumb 
throughout  the  colloquy. 

"  If  you  don't,  I  shall  have  to  send  for  you,"  said 
the  captain. 

"Oh,  I'll  come"  replied  the  girl,  in  a  sort  of 
disgust,  and  her  eyes  still  dwelt  upon  Lemuel. 

"  That 's  all,"  returned  the  captain,  and  the  girl, 
accepting  her  dismissal,  went  out. 

Now  that  it  was  too  late,  Lemuel  could  break  from 
his  nightmare.  "Oh,  don't  let  her  go  !  I  ain't  the 
one  !  I  was  running  after  a  fellow  that  passed  off 
a  counterfeit  ten-dollar  bill  on  me  in  the  Common 
vesterday.  I  never  touched  her  satchel.  I  never 

saw  her  before " 

"What's  that  1 "  demanded  the  captain  sharply. 
"  You  've  got  the  wrong  one  !  "  cried  Lemuel.     "  I 
never  did  anything  to  the  girl." 

"Why,  you  fool  !"  retorted  the  cnptain  angrily; 
"  why  didn't  you  say  that  when  she  was  here,  instead 
of  standing  there  like  a  dumb  animal  ?  Heigh  1  " 

Lemuel's  sudden  flow  of  speech  was  stopped  at 
its  source  again.  His  lips  were  locked ;  he  could 
not  answer  a  word. 

The  captain  went  on  angrily.     "If  you'd  spoke 
up  in  time,  may  be  I  might  'a'  let  you  go.     I  don't 
E 


66  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

want  to  do  a  man  any  harm  if  I  can't  do  him  some 
good.  Next  time,  if  you've  got  a  tongue  in  your 
head,  use  it.  I  can't  do  anything  for  you  now.  I 
got  to  commit  you." 

He  paused  between  his  sentences,  as  if  to  let 
Lemuel  speak,  but  the  boy  said  nothing.  The 
captain  pulled  his  book  impatiently  toward  him,  and 
too*k  up  his  pen. 

"What's  your  name?" 

"  Lemuel  Barker." 

"  I  thought  may  be  there  was  a  mistake  all  the 
while,"  said  the  captain  to  the  officer,  while  he  wrote 
down  Lemuel's  name.  "But  if  a  man  hain't  got 
sense  enough  to  speak  for  himself,  I  can't  put  the 
words  in  his  mouth.  Age  1 "  he  demanded  savagely 
of  Lemuel. 

"Twenty." 

"Weight?" 

"  A  hundred  and  thirty." 

"  I  could  see  with  half  an  eye  that  the  girl  wan't 
very  sanguine  about  it.  But  what 's  the  use  ?  / 
couldn't  tell  her  she  was  mistaken.  Height  1 " 

"Five  feet  six." 

"  Occupation  1 " 

"I  help  mother  carry  on  the  farm." 

"  Just  as  I  expected  ! "  cried  the  captain.  "  Slow 
as  a  yoke  of  oxen.  Residence  1 " 

"Willoughby  Pastures." 

The  captain  could  not  contain  himself.  "  Well, 
Willoughby  Pastures, — or  whatever  your  name  is, — 
you  '11  get  yourself  into  the  papers  this  time,  sure. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.   67 

And  I  must  say  it  serves  you  right.  If  you  can't 
speak  for  yourself,  who's  going  to  speak  for  you, 
do  you  suppose  ?  Might  send  round  to  the  girl's 

house No,  she  wouldn't  be  there,  ten  to  one. 

You  Ve  got  to  go  through  now.  Next  time  don't  be 
such  an  infernal  fool." 

The  captain  blotted  his  book  and  shut  it. 

"We'll  have  to  lock  him  up  here  to-night,"* he 
said  to  the  policeman.  "  Last  batch  has  gone  round. 
Better  go  through  him."  But  Lemuel  had  been  gone 
through  before,  and  the  officer's  search  of  his  pockets 
only  revealed  their  emptiness.  The  captain  struck 
a  bell  on  his  desk.  "If  it  ain't  all  right,  you  can 
make  it  right  with  the  judge  in  the  morning,"  he 
added  to  Lemuel. 

Lemuel  looked  up  at  the  policeman  who  had 
arrested  him.  He  was  an  elderly  man,  with  a  kindly 
face,  squarely  fringed  with  a  chin-beard.  The  boy 
tried  to  speak,  but  he  could  only  repeat,  "I  never 
saw  her  before.  I  never  touched  her." 

The  policeman  looked  at  him  and  then  at  the 
captain. 

"Too  late  now,"  said  the  latter.  "Got  to  go 
through  the  mill  this  time.  But  if'  it  ain't  right, 
you- can  make  it  right." 

Another  officer  had  answered  the  bell,  and  the 
captain  indicated  with  a  comprehensive  roll  of  his 
head  that  he  was  to  take  Lemuel  away  and  lock  him 
up. 

"  Oh,  my  !  "  moaned  the  boy.  As  they  passed  the 
door  of  a  small  room  opening  on  an  inner  corridor, 


68  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

a  smell  of  coffee  gushed  out  of  it ;  the  officer  stopped, 
and  Lemuel  caught  sight  of  two  gentlemen  in  the 
room  with  a  policeman,  who  was  saying — 

"  Get  a  cup  of  coffee  here  when  we  want  it.  Try 
one  1 "  he  suggested  hospitably. 

"  No,  thank  you,"  said  one  of  the  gentlemen,  with 
the  bland  respectfulness  of  people  being  shown  about 
an  institution.  "  How  many  of  you  are  attached  to 
this  station  ? " 

"  Eighty -one,"  said  the  officer.  "  Largest  station 
in  town.  Gang  goes  on  at  one  in  the  morning, 
and  another  at  eight,  and  another  at  six  P.M."  He 
looked  inquiringly  at  the  officer  in  charge  of  Lemuel. 

"  Any  matches  ?  "  asked  this  officer. 

"  Everything  but  money,"  said  the  other,  taking 
some  matches  out  of  his  waistcoat  pocket. 

Lemuel's  officer  went  ahead,  lighting  the  gas 
along  the  corridor,  and  the  boy  followed,  while  the 
other  officer  brought  up  the  rear  with  the  visitor 
whom  he  was  lecturing.  They  passed  some  neat 
rooms,  each  with  two  beds  in  it,  and  he  answered 
some  question  :  "  Tramps  1  Not  much  !  Give 
them  a  board  when  they're  drunk;  send  'em  round 
to  the  Wayfarers'  Lod^e  when  they're  sober.  These 
officers'  rooms." 

Lemuel  followed  his  officer  downstairs  into  a 
basement,  where  on  either  side  of  a  white-walled, 
brilliantly  lighted,  specklessly  clean  corridor,  there 
were  numbers  of  cells,  very  clean,  and  smelling  of 
fresh  whitewash.  Each  had  a  broad  low  shelf  in  it, 
and  a  bench  opposite,  a  little  wider  than  a  man's 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.        69 

body.  Lemuel  suddenly  felt  himself  pushed  into 
one  of  them,  and  then  a  railed  door  of  iron  was 
locked  upon  him.  He  stood  motionless  in  the 
breadth  of  light  and  lines  of  shade  which  the 
gas-light  cast  upon  him  through  the  door,  and  knew 
the  gentlemen  were  looking  at  him  as  their  guide 
talked. 

"  Well,  fill  up  pretty  well,  Sunday  nights.  Most 
the  arrests  for  drunkenness.  But  all  the  arrests 
before  seven  o'clock  sent  to  the  City  Prison.  Only 
keep  them  that  come  in  afterwards." 

One  of  the  gentlemen  looked  into  the  cell  opposite 
Lemuel's.  "  There  seems  to  be  only  one  bunk.  Do 
you  ever  put  more  into  a  cell  ? " 

"Well,  hardly  ever,  if  they're  men.  Lot  o' 
women  brought  in  'most  always  ask  to  be  locked  up 
together  for  company." 

"  I  don't  see  where  they  sleep,"  said  the  visitor. 
"  Do  they  lie  on  the  floor  1 " 

The  officer  laughed.  "  Sleep  1  They  don't  want  to 
sleep.  What  they  want  to  do  is  to  set  up  all  night, 
and  talk  it  over." 

Both  of  the  visitors  laughed. 

"  Some  of  the  cells,"  resumed  the  officer,  "  have 
two  bunks,  but  we  hardly  ever  put  more  than  one 
in  a  cell." 

The  visitors  noticed  that  a  section  of  the  rail  was 
removed  in  each  door  near  the  floor. 

"  That 's  to  put  a  dipper  of  water  through,  or  any 
thing,"  explained  the  officer.  "  There  !  "  he  continued, 
showing  them  Lemuel's  door ;  "  see  how  the  rails 


70  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE. 

are  bent  there  1  You  wouldn't  think  a  man  could 
squeeze  through  there,  but  we  found  a  fellow  half 
out  o'  that  one  night — backwards.  Captain  came 
down  with  a  rattan  and  made  it  hot  for  him." 

The  visitors  laughed,  and  Lemuel,  in  his  cell, 
shuddered. 

"  I  never  saw  anything  so  astonishingly  clean," 
said  one  of  the  gentlemen.  "  And  do  you  keep  the 
gas  burning  here  all  night  ? " 

"Yes;  calculate  to  give  'em  plenty  of  light," 
said  the  officer,  with  comfortable  satisfaction  in  the 
visitor's  complimentary  tone. 

"And  the  sanitary  arrangements  seem  to  be 
perfect,  doctor,"  said  the  other  visitor. 

"  Oh,  perfect." 

"  Yes,"  said  the  officer,  "  we  do  the  best  we  can 
for  'em." 

The  visitors  made  a  murmur  of  approbation. 
Their  steps  moved  away ;  Lemuel  heard  the  guide 
saying,  "  Dunno  what  that  fellow 's  in  for.  Find  out 
in  the  captain's  room." 

"  He  didn't  look  like  a  very  abandoned  ruffian," 
said  one  of  the  visitors,  with  both  pity  and  amuse 
ment  in  his  voice. 


VI. 


LEMUEL  stood  and  leaned  his  head  against  the 
wall  of  his  cell.  The  tears  that  had  come  to  his 
relief  in  the  morning  when  he  found  that  he  was 
robbed  would  not  come  now.  He  was  trembling 
with  famine  and  weakness,  but  he  could  not  lie  down  ; 
it  would  be  like  accepting  his  fate,  and  every  fibre 
of  his  body  joined  his  soul  in  rebellion  against  that. 
The  hunger  gnawed  him  incessantly,  mixed  with  an 
awful  sickness. 

After  a  long  time  a  policeman  passed  his  door 
with  another  prisoner,  a  drunken  woman,  whom  he 
locked  into  a  cell  at  the  end  of  the  corridor.  When 
he  came  back,  Lemuel  could  endure  it  no  longer. 
"  Say  !  "  he  called  huskily  through  his  door.  "  Won't 
you  give  me  a  cup  of  that  coffee  upstairs  ?  I  haven't 
had  anything  but  an  apple  to  eat  for  nearly  two 
days.  I  don't  want  you  to  give  me  the  coffee.  You 
can  take  my  clasp  button " 

The  officer  went  by  a  few  steps,  then  he  came 
back,  and  peered  in  through  the  door  at  Lemuel's 
face.  "  Oh  !  that 's  you  1 "  he  said  :  he  was  the  officer 
who  had  arrested  Lemuel. 


72  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"Yes.  Please  get  me  the  coffee.  I'm  afraid  I 
shall  have  a  fit  of  sickness  if  I  go  much  longer." 

"Well,"  said  the  officer,  "I  guess  I  can  get  you 
something."  He  went  away,  and  came  back,  after 
Lemuel  had  given  up  the  hope  of  his  return,  with  a 
saucerless  cup  of  coffee,  and  a  slice  of  buttered  bread 
laid  on  the  top  of  it.  He  passed  it  in  through  the 
opening  at  the  bottom  of  the  door. 

"Oh,  my  !  "  gasped  the  starving  boy.  He  thought 
he  should  drop  the  cup,  his  hand  shook  so  when  he 
took  it.  He  gulped  the  coffee,  and  swallowed  the 
bread  in  a  frenzy. 

"  Here — here 's  the  button,"  he  said,  as  he  passed 
the  empty  cup  out  to  the  officer. 

"I  don't  want  your  button,"  answered  the  police 
man.  He  hesitated  a  moment.  "  I  shall  be  round 
at  the  court  in  the  morning,  and  I  guess  if  it  ain't 
right  we  can  make  it  so." 

"  Thank  you,  sir,"  said  Lemuel,  humbly  grateful. 

"  You  lay  down  now,"  said  the  officer.  "  We 
shan't  put  anybody  in  on  you  to-night." 

"  I  guess  I  better,"  said  Lemuel.  He  crept  in  upon 
the  lower  shelf,  and  stretched  himself  out  in  his 
clothes,  with  his  arm  under  his  head  for  a  pillow. 
The  drunken  woman  at  the  end  of  the  corridor  was 
clamouring  to  get  out.  She  wished  to  get  out  just 
half  a  minute,  she  said,  and  settle  with  that  hussy ; 
then  she  would  come  back  willingly.  Sometimes 
she  sang,  sometimes  she  swore ;  but  with  the  coffee 
still  sensibly  hot  in  his  stomach,  and  the  comfort  of 
it  in  every  vein,  her  uproar  turned  into  an  agreeable 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.   73 

fantastic  medley  for  Lemuel,  and  he  thought  it  was 
the  folks  singing  in  church  at  Willoughby  Pastures, 
and  they  were  all  asking  him  who  the  new  girl  in 
the  choir  was,  and  he  was  saying  Statira  Dudley  ; 
and  then  it  all  slipped  off  into  a  smooth,  yellow 
nothingness,  and  he  heard  some  one  calling  him  to 
get  up. 

When  he  woke  in  the  morning  he  started  up  so 
suddenly  that  he  struck  his  head  against  the  shelf 
above  him,  and  lay  staring  stupidly  at  the  iron-work 
of  his  door. 

He  heard  the  order  to  turn  out  repeated  at  other 
cells  along  the  corridor,  and  he  crept  out  of  his  shelf, 
and  then  sat  down  upon  it,  waiting  for  his  door  to 
be  unlocked.  He  was  very  hungry  again,  and  he 
trembled  with  faintness.  He  wondered  how  he 
should  get  his  breakfast,  and  he  dreaded  the  trial  in 
court  less  than  the  thought  of  going  through  another 
day  with  nothing  to  eat.  He  heard  the  stir  of  the 
other  prisoners  in  the  cells  along  the  corridors,  the 
low  groans  and  sighs  with  which  people  pull  them 
selves  together  after  a  bad  night ;  and  he  heard  the 
voice  of  the  drunken  woman,  now  sober,  poured 
out  in  voluble  remorse,  and  in  voluble  promise  of 
amendment  for  the  future,  to  every  one  who  passed, 
if  they  would  let  her  off  easy.  She  said  aisy,  of 
course,  and  it  was  in  her  native  accent  that  she  be 
wailed  the  fate  of  the  little  ones  whom  her  arrest 
had  left  motherless  at  home.  No  one  seemed  to 
answer  her,  but  presently  she  broke  into  a  cry  of  joy 
and  blessing,  and  from  her  cell  at  the  other  end  of 


74  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

the  corridor  came  the  clink  of  crockery.  Steps 
approached  with  several  pauses,  and  at  last  they 
paused  at  Lemuel's  door,  and  a  man  outside  stooped 
and  pushed  in,  through  the  opening  at  the  bottom, 
a  big  bowl  of  baked  beans,  a  quarter  of  a  loaf  of 
bread,  and  a  tin  cup  full  of  coffee.  "  Coffee  's  extra," 
he  said  jocosely.  "Conies  from  the  officers.  You're 
in  luck,  young  feller." 

"  I  ha'n't  got  anything  to  pay  for  it  with,"  faltered 
Lemuel. 

"  Guess  they  '11  trust  you,"  said  the  man.  "  Any- 
rate,  I  got  orders  to  leave  it."  He  passed  on,  and 
Lemuel  gathered  up  his  breakfast,  and  arranged  it 
on  the  shelf  where  he  had  slept ;  then  he  knelt  down 
before  it,  and  ate. 

An  hour  later  an  officer  came  and  unbolted  his 
door  from  the  outside.  "  Hurry  up,"  he  said ; 
"  Maria 's  waiting." 

"  Maria  1 "  repeated  Lemuel  innocently. 

"  Yes,"  returned  the  officer.  "  Other  name 's 
Black.  She  don't  like  to  wait.  Come  out  of  here." 

Lemuel  found  himself  in  the  corridor  with  four 
or  five  other  prisoners,  whom  some  officers  took  in 
charge  and  conducted  upstairs  to  the  door  of  the 
station.  He  saw  no  woman,  but  a  sort  of  omnibus 
without  windows  was  drawn  up  at  the  curbstone. 

"I  thought^"  he  said  to  an  officer,  "that there  was 
a  lady  waiting  to  see  me.  Maria  Black,"  he  added, 
seeing  that  the  officer  did  not  understand. 

The  policeman  roared,  and  could  not  help  putting 
his  head  in  at  the  office  door  to  tell  the  joke. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.       75 

"Well,  you  must  introduce  him,"  called  a  voice 
from  within. 

"  Guess  you  ha'n't  got  the  name  exactly  straight, 
young  man,"  said  the  policeman  to  Lemuel,  as  he 
guarded  him  down  the  steps.  "It's  Black  Maria 
you're  looking  for.  There  she  is,"  he  continued, 
pointing  to  the  omnibus,  "  and  don't  you  forget  it. 
She 's  particular  to  have  folks  recognise  her.  She 's 
blacker 'n  she's  painted." 

The  omnibus  was,  in  fact,  a  sort  of  aesthetic  drab, 
relieved  with  salmon,  as  Lemuel  had  time  to  notice 
before  he  was  hustled  into  it  with  the  other  prisoners, 
and  locked  in. 

There  were  already  several  there,  and  as  Lemuel's 
eyes  accustomed  themselves  to  the  light  that  came 
in  through  the  little  panes  at  the  sides  of  the  roof, 
he  could  see  that  they  were  women ;  and  by  and  by 
he  saw  that  two  of  them  were  the  saucy  girls  who 
had  driven  him  from  his  seat  in  the  Common  that 
day,  and  laughed  so  at  him.  They  knew  him  too, 
and  one  of  them  set  up  a  shrill  laugh.  "  Hello, 
Johnny  !  That  you  1  You  don't  say  so  1  What 
you  up  for  this  time  ?  Going  down  to  the  Island  ? 
Well,  give  us  a  call  there  I  Do  be  sociable  !  Ward 
11  's  the  address."  The  other  one  laughed,  and  then 
swore  at  the  first  for  trying  to  push  her  off  the  seat. 

Lemuel  broke  out  involuntarily  in  all  the  severity 
that  was  native  to  him.  "  You  ought  to  be  ashamed 
of  yourselves." 

This  convulsed  the  bold  things  with  laughter. 
When  they  could  get  their  breath,  one  of  them  said, 


76  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"  Pshaw  !  I  know  what  he  's  up  for  :  preaching  on 
the  Common.  Say,  young  feller  !  don't  you  want  to 
hold  a  prayer-meetin'  here  ?  " 

They  burst  into  another  shriek  of  laughter,  so  wild 
and  shrill  that  the  driver  rapped  on  the  roof,  and 
called  down,  "Dry  up  in  there  !  " 

"Oh,  you  mind  your  horses,  and  we'll  look  after 
the  passengers.  Go  and  set  on  his  knee,  Jen,  and 
cheer  him  up  a  little." 

Lemuel  sat  in  a  quiver  of  abhorrence.  The  girl 
appealed  to  remained  giggling  beside  her  companion. 

"  I — I  pity  ye  !  "  said  Lemuel. 

The  Irishwoman  had  not  stopped  bewailing  her 
self,  and  imploring  right  and  left  an  easy  doom.  She 
now  addressed  herself  wholly  to  Lemuel,  whose 
personal  dignity  seemed  to  clothe  him  with  authority 
in  her  eyes.  She  told  him  about  her  children,  left 
alone  with  no  one  to  look  after  them ;  the  two  little 
girls,  the  boy  only  three  years  old.  When  the  van 
stopped  at  a  station  to  take  in  more  passengers,  she 
tried  to  get  out — to  tell  the  gentlemen  at  the  office 
about  it,  she  said. 

After  several  of  these  halts  they  stopped  at  the 
basement  of  a  large  stone  building,  that  had  a  wide 
flight  of  steps  in  front,  and  columns,  like  the  church 
at  Willoughby  Pastures,  only  the  church  steps  were 
wood,  and  the  columns  painted  pine.  Here  more 
officers  took  charge  of  them,  and  put  them  in  a 
room  where  there  were  already  twenty-five  or  thirty 
other  prisoners,  the  harvest  of  the  night  before ; 
and  presently  another  van-load  was  brought  in. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.       77 

There  were  many  women  among  them,  but  here 
there  was  no  laughing  or  joking  as  there  had  been 
in  the  van.  Scarcely  any  one  spoke,  except  the 
Irishwoman,  who  crept  up  to  an  officer  at  the  door 
from  time  to  time,  ar*d  begged  him  to  tell  the  judge 
to  let  her  have  it  easy  this  time.  Lemuel  could  not 
help  seeing  that  she  and  most  of  the  others  were 
familiar  with  the  place.  Those  two  saucy  jades  who 
had  mocked  him  were  silent,  and  had  lost  their  bold 
looks. 

After  waiting  what  seemed  a  long  time,  the  door 
was  opened,  and  they  were  driven  up  a  flight  of 
stairs  into  a  railed  enclosure  at  the  corner  of  a  large 
room,  where  they  remained  huddled  together,  while 
a  man  at  a  long  desk  rattled  over  something  that 
ended  with  "God  bless  the  commonwealth  of 
Massachusetts."  On  a  platform  behind  the  speaker 
sat  a  grey-haired  man  in  spectacles,  and  Lemuel 
knew  that  he  was  in  the  court-room,  and  that  this 
must  be  the  judge.  He  could  not  see  much  of  the 
room  over  the  top  of  the  railing,  but  there  was  a 
buzz  of  voices  and  a  stir  of  feet  beyond,  that  made 
him  think  the  place  was  full.  But  full  or  empty,  it 
was  the  same  to  him  ;  his  shame  could  not  be  greater 
or  less.  He  waited  apathetically  while  the  clerk 
read  off  the  charges  against  the  vastly  greater  number 
of  his  fellow-prisoners  arrested  for  drunkenness. 
When  these  were  disposed  of,  he  read  from  the  back 
of  a  paper,  which  he  took  from  a  fresh  pile,  "  Bridget 
Gallagher,  complained  of  for  habitual  drunkenness. 
Guilty  oi'  not  guilty  1 " 


78  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"  Not  guilty,  your  honour,"  answered  the  Irish 
woman  who  had  come  from  Lemuel's  station.  "  But 
make  it  aisy  for  me  this  time,  judge,  and  ye  '11  never 
catch  me  in  it  again.  I  've  three  helpless  childer 
at  home,  your  honour,  starvini  and  cryin'  for  their 
mother.  Holy  Mary,  make  it  aisy,  judge  ! " 

A  laugh  went  round  the  room,  which  a  stern  voice 
checked  with  "  Silence,  there  ! "  but  which  renewed 
itself  when  the  old  woman  took  the  stand  at  the  end 
of  the  clerk's  long  desk,  while  a  policeman  mounted 
a  similar  platform  outside  the  rail,  and  gave  his 
testimony  against  her.  It  was  very  conclusive,  and 
it  was  not  affected  by  the  denials  with  which  the 
poor  woman  gave  herself  away  more  and  more.  She 
had  nothing  to  say  when  invited  to  do  so  except 
to  beg  for  mercy  ;  the  judge  made  a  few  inquiries, 
apparently  casual,  of  the  policeman  ;  then  after  a 
moment's  silence,  in  which  he  sat  rubbing  his  chin, 
he  leaned  forward  and  said  quietly  to  the  clerk, 
"  Give  her  three  months." 

The  woman  gave  a  wild  Irish  cry,  "0  my 
poor  childer ! "  and  amidst  the  amusement  of  the 
spectators,  which  the  constables  could  not  check  at 
once,  was  led  wailing  below. 

Before  Lemuel  could  get  his  breath  those  bold 
girls,  one  after  the  other,  were  put  upon  the  stand. 
The  charge  against  them  was  not  made  the  subject 
of  public  investigation  ;  the  judge  and  some  other 
elderly  gentleman  talked  it  over  together ;  and  the 
girls,  who  had  each  wept  in  pleading  guilty,  were 
put  on  probation,  as  Lemuel  understood  it,  and, 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.       79 

weeping  still  and  bridling  a  little,  were  left  in  charge 
of  this  elderly  gentleman,  and  Lemuel  saw  them  no 
more. 

One  case  followed  another,  and  Lemuel  listened 
with  the  fascination  of  terror ;  the  sentences  seemed 
terribly  severe,  and  out  of  all  proportion  to  the 
offences.  Suddenly  his  own  name  was  called.  His 
name  had  been  called  in  public  places  before  :  at  the 
school  exhibitions,  where  he  had  taken  prizes  in 
elocution  and  composition;  in  church,  once,  when 
the  minister  had  mentioned  him  for  peculiar  efficiency 
and  zeal  among  other  Sabbath-school  teachers.  It 
was  sacred  to  him  for  his  father's  sake,  who  fell 
in  the  war,  and  who  was  recorded  in  it  on  the 
ugly,  pathetic  monument  on  the  village  green ;  and 
hitherto  he  had  made  it  respected  and  even  honoured, 
and  had  tried  all  the  harder  to  keep  it  so  because 
his  family  was  poor,  and  his  mother  had  such  queer 
ways  and  dressed  so.  He  dragged  himself  to  the 
stand  which  he  knew  he  must  mount,  and  stole 
from  under  his  eyelashes  a  glance  at  the  court-room, 
which  took  it  all  in.  There  were  some  people,  whom 
he  did  not  know  for  reporters,  busy  \yith  their 
pencils  next  the  railings;  and  there  was  a  semi 
circular  table  in  the  middle  of  the  room  at  which  a 
large  number  of  policemen  sat,  and  they  had  their 
straw  helmets  piled  upon  it,  with  the  hats  of  the 
lawyers  who  sat  among  them.  Beyond,  the  seats 
which  covered  the  floor  were  filled  with  the  sodden 
loafers  whom  the  law  offers  every  morning  the  best 
dramatic  amusement  in  the  city.  Presently,  among 


80  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

the  stupid  eyes  fixed  upon  him,  Lemuel  was  aware 
of  the  eyes  of  that  fellow  who  had  passed  the 
counterfeit  money  on  him  ;  and  when  this  scamp 
got  up  and  coolly  sauntered  out  of  the  room,  Lemuel 
was  held  in  such  a  spell  that  he  did  not  hear  the 
charge  read  against  him,  or  the  clerk's  repeated 
demand,  "  Guilty  or  not  guilty  1 " 

He  was  recalled  to  himself  by  the  voice  of  the 
judge.  "  Young  man,  do  you  understand  ?  Are 
you  guilty  of  assaulting  this  lady  and  taking  her 
satchel,  or  not  1 " 

"  Not  guilty,"  said  Lemuel  huskily ;  and  he 
looked,  not  at  the  judge,  but  at  the  pretty  girl,  who 
confronted  him  from  a  stand  at  the  other  end  of  the 
clerk's  desk,  blushing  to  find  herself  there  up  to  her 
wide-flung  blue  eyes.  Lemuel  blushed  too,  and 
dropped  his  eyes ;  and  it  seemed  to  him  in  a  crazy 
kind  of  way  that  it  was  impolite  to  have  pleaded 
not  guilty  against  her  accusation.  He  stood  waiting 
for  the  testimony  which  the  judge  had  to  prompt 
her  to  offer. 

"State  the  facts  in  regard  to  the  assault,"  he  said 
gravely.  . 

"  I  don't  know  as  I  can  do  it,  very  well,"  began 
the  girl. 

"  We  shall  be  satisfied  if  you  do  your  best,"  said 
the  judge,  with  the  glimmer  of  a  smile,  which  spread 
to  a  laugh  among  the  spectators,  unrebuked  by  the 
constables,  since  the  judge  had  invited  it. 

In  this  atmosphere  of  sympathy  the  girl  found  her 
tongue,  and  with  a  confiding  twist  of  her  pretty  head 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.       81 

began  again  :  "  Well,  now,  1 11  tell  you  just  how  it 
was.  I  'd  just  got  my  book  out  of  the  Public  Library, 
and  I  was  going  down  Neponset  Street  on  my  way 
home,  hurrying  along,  because  I  see  it  was  beginning 
to  be  pretty  late,  and  the  first  thing  I  know  some 
body  pulled  my  hat  down  over  my  eyes,  and  tore 
the  brim  half  off,  so  I  don't  suppose  I  can  ever  wear 
it  again,  it 's  such  a  lookin'  thing ;  any  rate  it  ain't 
the  one  I  've  got  on,  though  it  ;s  some  like  it ;  and 
then  the  next  thing,  somebody  grabbed  away  the 
satchel  I  'd  got  on  my  arm ;  and  as  soon  as  I  could 
get  my  eyes  clear  again,  I  see  two  fellows  chasin'  up 
the  street,  and  I  told  the  officer  somebody  ;d  got  my 
book ;  and  I  knew  it  was  one  of  those  fellows  runnin' 
away,  and  I  said,  'There  they  go  now,'  and  the 
officer  caught  the  hind  one,  and  I  guess  the  other 
one  got  away;  and  the  officer  told  me  to  follow 
along  to  the  station-house,  and  when  we  got  there 
they  took  my  name,  and  where  I  roomed,  and  my 
age " 

"  Do  you  recognise  this  young  man  as  one  of  the 
persons  who  robbed  you  1 "  interrupted  the  judge, 
nodding  his  head  toward  Lemuel,  who  now  lifted 
his  head  and  looked  his  accuser  fearlessly  in  her 
pretty  eyes. 

"  Why,  no  ! "  she  promptly  replied.  "  The  first 
thing  I  knew,  he  'd  pulled  my  hat  over  my  eyes." 

"But  you  recognise  him  as  one  of  those  you  saw 
running  away  ? " 

"  Ch  yes,  he  's  one  of  them,"  said  the  girl. 

"What  made  you  think  he  had  robbed  you1? " 


82  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"  Why,  because  my  satchel  was  gone  !  "  returned 
the  girl,  with  logic  that  apparently  amused  the 
gentlemen  of  the  bar. 

"But  why  did  you  think  he  had  taken  it  1 " 
"  Because  I  see  him  running  away." 
"You   couldn't  swear  that  he  was  the  one  who 
took  your  satchel  1  " 

"  Why,  of  course  not !  I  didn't  see  him  till  I  saw 
him  running.  And  I  don't  know  as  he  was  the  one, 
now,"  added  the  girl,  in  a  sudden  burst  of  generosity. 
"And  if  it  was  to  do  over  again,  I  should  say 
as  much  to  the  officers  at  the  station.  But  I  got 
confused  when  they  commenced  askin'  me  who  I 
was,  and  how  much  I  weighed,  and  what  my  height 
was ;  and  he  didn't  say  anything ;  and  I  got  to 
thinkin'  may  be  it  was  ;  and  when  they  told  me  that 
if  I  didn't  promise  to  appear  at  court  in  the  morning 
they  'd  have  to  lock  me  up,  I  was  only  too  glad  to 
get  away  alive." 

By  this  time  all  the  blackguard  audience  were 
sharing,  unchecked,  the  amusement  of  the  bar. 
The  judge  put  up  his  hand  to  hide  a  laugh.  Then 
he  said  to  Lemuel,  "  Do  you  wish  to  question  the 
plaintiff  ]" 

The  two  young  things  looked  at  each  other,  and 
both  blushed.  "  No,"  said  Lemuel. 

The  girl  looked  at  the  judge  for  permission,  and 
at  a  nod  from  him  left  the  stand  and  sat  down. 

The  officer  who  had  arrested  Lemuel  took  the 
stand  on  the  other  side  of  the  rail  from  him,  and 
corroborated  the  girl's  story ;  but  he  had  not  seen 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.   83 

the  assault  or  robbery,  and  could  not  swear  to  either. 
Then  Lemuel  was  invited  to  speak,  and  told  his 
story  with  the  sort  of  nervous  courage  that  came 
to  him  in  extremity.  He  told  it  from  the  beginning, 
and  his  adventure  with  the  two  beats  in  the  Com 
mon  made  the  audience  laugh  again.  Even  then, 
Lemuel  could  not  see  the  fun  of  it ;  he  stopped,  and 
the  stout  ushers  in  blue  flannel  sacks  commanded 
silence.  Then  Lemuel  related  how  he  had  twice 
seen  one  of  the  beats  since  that  time,  but  he  was 
ashamed  to  say  how  he  had  let  him  escape  out  of 
that  very  room  half  an  hour  before.  He  told  how 
he  had  found  the  beat  in  the  crowd  before  the  saloon, 
and  how  he  was  chasing  him  up  the  street  when  he 
heard  the  young  lady  hollo  out,  "There  they  go 
now  !  "  and  then  the  officer  arrested  him. 

The  judge  sat  a  moment  in  thought ;  then  said 
quietly,  "The  charge  is  dismissed;"  and  before 
Lemuel  well  knew  what  it  meant,  a  gate  was  opened 
at  the  stand,  and  he  was  invited  to  pass  out.  He 
was  free.  The  officer  who  had  arrested  him  shook 
his  hand  in  congratulation  and  excuse,  and  the 
lawyers  and  the  other  policemen  gave  him  a  friendly 
glance.  The  loafers  and  beats  of  the  audience  did 
not  seem  to  notice  him.  They  were  already  intent 
upon  a  case  of  coloured  assault  and  battery  which 
had  been  called,  and  which  opened  with  the  promise 
of  uncommon  richness,  both  of  the  parties  being 
women. 

Lemuel  saw  that  girl  who  had  accused  him  passing 
down  the  aisle  on  the  other  side  of  the  room.  She 


84  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

was  with  another  girl,  who  looked  older.  'Lemuel 
walked  fast,  to  get  out  of  their  way ;  he  did  not 
know  why,  but  he  did  not  want  to  speak  to  the  girl. 
They  walked  fast  too,  and  when  he  got  down  the 
stairs  on  to  the  ground  floor  of  the  court-house  they 
overtook  him. 

"  Say  1 "  said  the  older  girl,  "  I  want  to  speak  to 
you.  I  think  it 's  a  down  shame,  the  way  that  you  Ve 
been  treated  ;  and  Statira,  she  feels  jus'  's  I  do  about 
it ;  and  I  tell  her  she  's  got  to  say  so.  It 's  the  least 
she  can  do,  I  tell  her,  after  what  she  got  you  in  for. 
My  name 's  'Manda  Grier ;  I  room  'th  S'tira ;  V  I 
come  'th  her  this  mornin'  t'  help  keep  her  up  ;  b't  I 
didn't  know  't  was  goin'  to  be  s'ch  a,  perfect  flat-out !  " 

As  the  young  woman  rattled  on  she  grew  more 
and  more  glib ;  she  was  what  they  call  whopper- 
jawed,  and  spoke  a  language  almost  purely  conson 
antal,  cutting  and  clipping  her  words  with  a  rapid 
play  of  her  whopper-jaw  till  there  was  nothing  but 
the  bare  bones  left  of  them.  Statira  was  crying,  and 
Lemuel  could  not  bear  to  see  her  cry.  He  tried  to 
say  something  to  comfort  her,  but  all  he  could  think 
of  was,  "  I  hope  you  '11  get  your  book  back,"  and 
'Manda  Grier  answered  for  her — 

"  Oh,  I  guess  't  ain't  the  book 't  she  cares  for.  S' 
far  forth  's  the  book  goes,  I  guess  she  can  afford  to 
buy  another  book,  well  enough.  B't  I  tell  her  she  's 
done  'n  awful  thing,  and  a  thing  't  she  '11  carry  to  her 
grave  'th  her,  'n't  she  '11  remember  to  her  dyin'  day. 
That 's  what  /  tell  her." 

"She  ha'n't  got  any  call  to  feel   bad  about  it," 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.   85 

said  Lemuel  clumsily.  "It  was  just  a  mistake." 
Then,  not  knowing  what  more  to  say,  he  said,  being 
come  to  the  outer  door  by  this  time,  "  Well,  I  wish 
you  good  morning." 

"  Well,  good  morning,"  said  'Manda  Grier,  and 
she  thrust  her  elbow  sharply  into  Statira  Dudley's 
side,  so  that  she  also  said  faintly — 

"  Well,  good  morning  !  "  She  was  fluent  enough 
on  the  witness-stand  and  in  the  police  station,  but 
now  she  could  not  find  a  word  to  say. 

The  three  stood  together  on  the  threshold  of  the 
court-house,  not  knowing  how  to  get  away  from  one 
another. 

'Manda  Grier  put  out  her  hand  to  Lemuel.  He 
took  it,  and,  "  Well,  good  morning,"  he  said  again. 

"  Well,  good  morning,"  repeated  'Manda  Grier. 

Then  Statira  put  out  her  hand,  and  she  and 
Lemuel  shook  hands,  and  said  together,  "  Well, 
good  morning,"  and  on  these  terms  of  high  civility 
they  parted.  He  went  one  way  and  they  another. 
He  did  not  look  back,  but  the  two  girls,  marching 
off  with  locked  arms  and  flying  tongues,  when  they 
came  to  the  corner,  turned  to  look  back.  They 
both  turned  inward,  and  so  bumped  their  heads  to 
gether. 

"  Why,  you — coot !  "  cried  'Manda  Grier,  and  they 
broke  out  laughing. 

Lemuel  heard  their  laugh,  and  he  knew  they  were 
laughing  at  him  ;  but  he  did  not  care.  He  wandered 
on,  he  did  not  know  whither,  and  presently  he  came 
to  the  only  place  he  could  remember. 


VII. 


THE  place  was  the  Common,  where  his  trouble 
had  begun.  He  looked  back  to  the  beginning,  and 
could  see  that  it  was  his  own  fault.  To  be  sure, 
you  might  say  that  if  a  fellow  came  along  and  offered 
to  pay  you  fifty  cents  for  changing  a  ten-dollar  bill, 
you  had  a  right  to  take  it ;  but  there  was  a  voice  in 
Lemuel's  heart  which  warned  him  that  greed  to 
another's  hurt  was  sin,  and  that  if  you  took  too  much 
for  a  thing  from  a  necessitous  person,  you  oppressed 
and  robbed  him.  You  could  make  it  appear  other 
wise,  but  you  could  not  really  change  the  nature  of 
the  act.  He  owned  this  with  a  sigh,  and  he  owned 
himself  justly  punished.  He  was  still  on  those 
terms  of  personal  understanding  with  the  eternal 
spirit  of  right  which  most  of  us  lose  later  in  life, 
when  we  have  so  often  seemed  to  see  the  effect  fail 
to  follow  the  cause,  both  in  the  case  of  our  own 
misdeeds  and  the  misdeeds  of  others. 

He  sat  down  on  a  bench,  and  he  sat  there  all  day, 
except  when  he  went  to  drink  from  the  tin  cup 
dangling  by  the  chain  from  the  nearest  fountain. 
His  good  breakfast  kept  him  from  being  hungry  for 

86 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.        87 

,a  while,  but  he  was  as  aimless  and  as  hopeless  as 
ever,  and  as  destitute.  He  would  have  gone  home 
no\vr  if  he  had  had  the  money ;  he  was  afraid  they 
would  be  getting  anxious  about  him  there,  though  he 
had  not  made  any  particular  promises  about  the  time 
of  returning.  He  had  dropped  a  postal  card  into  a 
box  as  soon  as  he  reached  Boston,  to  tell  of  his  safe 
arrival,  and  they  would  not  expect  him  to  write 
again. 

There  were  only  two  ways  for  him  to  get  home  : 
to  turn  tramp  and  walk  back,  or  to  go  to  that  Mr. 
Sewell  and  borrow  the  money  to  pay  his  passage. 
To  walk  home  would  add  intolerably  to  the  public 
shame  he  must  suffer,  and  the  thought  of  going  to 
Mr.  Sewell  was,  even  in  the  secret  which  it  would 
remain  between  him  and  the  minister,  a  pang  so 
cruel  to  his  pride  that  he  recoiled  from  it  instantly. 
He  said  to  himself  he  would  stand  it  one  day  more  ; 
something  might  happen,  and  if  nothing  happened, 
he  should  think  of  it  again.  In  the  meantime  he 
thought  of  other  things  :  of  that  girl,  among  the  rest, 
and  how  she  looked  at  the  different  times.  As 
nearly  as  he  could  make  out,  she  seemed  to  be  a 
very  fashionable  girl ;  at  any  rate,  she  was  dressed 
fashionably,  and  she  was  nice-looking.  He  did  not 
know  whether  she  had  behaved  very  sensibly,  but  he 
presumed  she  was  some  excited. 
.  Toward  dark,  when  Lemuel  was  reconciling  him 
self  to  another  night's  sleep  in  the  open  air,  a 
policeman  sauntered  along  the  mall,  and  as  he  drew 
nearer  the  boy  recognised  his  friendly  captor.  He 


88  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

dropped  his  head,  but  it  was  too  late.  The  officer 
knew  him,  and  stopped  before  him. 

"  Well,"  he  said,  "hard  at  it,  I  see." 

Lemuel  made  no  answer,  but  he  was  aware  of  a 
friendly  look  in  the  officer's  face,  mixed  with  fatherly 
severity. 

"  I  was  in  hopes  you  had  started  back  to  Wil- 
loughby  Pastur's  before  this.  You  don't  want  to 
get  into  the  habit  of  settin'  round  on  the  Common, 
much.  First  thing  you  know  you  can't  quit  it. 
Where  you  goin'  to  put  up  to-night  ?  " 

"  I  don't  know,"  murmured  Lemuel 

"  Got  no  friends  in  town  you  can  go  to  1 " 

"No." 

"  Well,  now,  look  here  !  Do  you  think  you  could 
find  your  way  back  to  the  station  1 " 

"  I  guess  so,"  said  Lemuel,  looking  up  at  the  officer 
questioningly. 

"Well,  when  you  get  tired  of  this,  you  come 
round,  and  we  '11  provide  a  bed  for  you.  And  you 
get  back  home  to-morrow,  quick  as  you  can." 

"Thank  you,"  said  Lemuel.  He  was  helpless 
against  the  advice  and  its  unjust  implication,  but  he 
could  not  say  anything. 

"  Get  out  o'  Boston,  anyway,  wherever  you  go  or 
don't  go,"  continued  the  officer.  "  It 's  a  bad 
place." 

He  walked  on,  and  left  Lemuel  to  himself  again. 
He  thought  bitterly  that  no  one  knew  better  than 
himself  how  luridly  wicked  Boston  was,  and  that 
there  was  probably  not  a  soul  in  it  more  helplessly 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.       89 

anxious  to  get  out  of  it.  He  thought  it  hard  to  be 
talked  to  as  if  it  were  his  fault ;  as  if  he  wished  to 
become  a  vagrant  and  a  beggar.  He  sat  there  an 
hour  or  two  longer,  and  then  he  took  the  officer's 
advice  so  far  as  concerned  his  going  to  the  station 
for  a  bed,  swallowing  his  pride  as  he  must.  He 
must  do  that,  or  he  must  go  to  Mr.  Sewell.  It  was 
easier  to  accept  humiliation  at  the  hands  of  strangers. 
He  found  his  way  there  with  some  difficulty,  and 
slinking  in  at  the  front  door,  he  waited  at  the 
threshold  of  the  captain's  room  while  he  and  two  or 
three  officers  disposed  of  a  respectably  dressed  man, 
whom  a  policeman  was  holding  up  by  the  collar  of 
his  coat.  They  were  searching  his  pockets  and 
taking  away  his  money,  his  keys,  and  his  pencil 
and  penknife,  which  the  captain  sealed  up  in  a  large 
envelope,  and  put  into  his  desk. 

"  There  !  take  him  and  lock  him  up.  He  's  pretty 
well  loaded,"  said  the  captain. 

Then  he  looked  up  and  saw  Lemuel.  "  Hello  ! 
Can't  keep  away,  eh  1 "  he  demanded  jocosely.  "Well, 
we  've  heard  about  you.  I  told  you  the  judge  would 
make  it  all  right.  What 's  wanted  1  Bed  ?  Well, 
here  ! "  The  captain  filled  up  a  blank  which  he 
took  from  a  pigeon-hole,  and  gave  it  to  Lemuel.  "  I 
guess  that  '11  fix  you  out  for  the  night.  And  to 
morrow  you  put  back  to  Willoughby  Pastures  tight 
as  you  can  get  there.  You  're  on  the  wrong  track 
now.  First  thing  you  know  you  '11  be  a  professional 
tramp,  and  then  you  won't  be  worth  the  powder  to 
blow^you.  I  use  plain  talk  with  you  because  you  're 


90  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

a  beginner.  I  wouldn't  waste  my  breath  on  that 
fellow  behind  you." 

Lemuel  looked  round,  and  almost  touched  with 
his  a  face  that  shone  fiery  red  through  the  rusty 
growth  of  a  week's  beard,  and  recoiled  from  a  figure 
that  was  fouler  as  to  shirt  and  coat  and  trousers  than 
anything  the  boy  had  seen ;  though  the  tramps  used 
to  swarm  through  Willoughby  Pastures  before  the 
Selectmen  began  to  lock  them  up  in  the  town  poor- 
house  and  set  them  to  breaking  stone.  There  was 
no  ferocity  in  the  loathsome  face  ;  it  was  a  vagrant 
swine  that  looked  from  it,  no  worse  in  its  present 
mood  than  greedy  and  sleepy. 

"Bed?"  demanded  the  captain,  writing  another 
blank:  "Never  been  here  before,  I  suppose]"  he 
continued  with  good-natured  irony.  "I  don't  seem 
to  remember  you." 

The  captain  laughed,  and  the  tramp  returned  a 
husky  "  Thank  you,  sir,"  and  took  himself  off  into 
the  street. 

Then  the  captain  came  to  Lemuel's  help.  "  You 
follow  him,"  he  said,  "and  you'll  come  to  a  bed  by 
and  by." 

He  went  out,  and,  since  he  could  do  no  better, 
did  as  he  was  bid.  He  had  hardly  ever  seen  a 
drunken  man  at  Willoughby  Pastures,  where  the 
prohibition  law  was  strictly  enforced ;  there  was  no 
such  person  as  a  thief  in  the  whole  community,  and 
the  tramps  were  gone  long  ago.  Yet  here  was  he, 
famed  at  home  for  the  rectitude  of  his  life  and  the 
loftiness  of  his  aims,  consorting  with  drunkards  and 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.   91 

thieves  and  tramps,  and  warned  against  what  he 
was  doing  by  a  policeman,  as  if  he  was  doing  it  of 
his  own  will.  It  was  very  strange  business.  If  it 
was  all  a  punishment  for  taking  that  fellow's  half- 
dollar,  it  was  pretty  heavy  punishment.  He  was  not 
going  to  say  that  it  was  unjust,  but  he  would  say  it 
was  hard.  His  spirit  was  now  so  bruised  and  broken 
that  he  hardly  knew  what  to  think. 

He  followed  the  tramp  as  far  off  as  he  could  and 
still  keep  him  in  sight,  and  he  sometimes  thought 
he  had  lost  him,  in  the  streets  that  climbed  and 
crooked  beyond  the  Common  towards  the  quarter 
whither  they  were  going  ;  but  he  reappeared,  slouch 
ing  and  shambling  rapidly  on,  in  the  glare  of  some 
electric  lights  that  stamped  the  ground  with  shadows 
thick  and  black  as  if  cut  in  velvet  or  burnt  into  the 
surface.  Here  and  there  some  girl  brushed  against 
the  boy,  and  gave  him  a  joking  or  jeering  word  ; 
her  face  flashed  into  light  for  a  moment,  and  then 
vanished  in  the  darkness  she  passed  into.  It  was 
that  hot  October,  and  the  night  was  close  and  still ; 
on  the  steps  of  some  of  the  houses  groups  of  fat, 
weary  women  were  sitting,  and  children  were  playing 
on  the  sidewalks,  using  the  lamp-posts  for  goal  or 
tag.  The  tramp  ahead  of  Lemuel  issued  upon  a 
brilliantly  lighted  little  square,  with  a  great  many 
horse-cars  coming  and  going  in  it ;  a  church  with 
stores  on  the  ground  floor,  and  fronting  it  on  one 
side  a  row  of  handsome  old  stone  houses  with  iron 
fences,  and  on  another  a  great  hotel,  with  a  high- 
pillared  portico,  where  men  sat  talking  and  smoking. 


92  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE. 

People  were  waiting  on  the  sidewalk  to  take  the 
cars ;  a  druggist's  window  threw  its  mellow  lights 
into  the  street ;  from  open  cellar-ways  came  the 
sound  of  banjos  and  violins.  At  one  of  these  cellar 
doors  his  guide  lingered  so  long  that  Lemuel  thought 
he  should  have  to  find  the  way  beyond  for  himself. 
But  the  tramp  suddenly  commanded  himself  from 
the  music,  the  light,  and  the  smell  of  strong  drink, 
which  Lemuel  caught  a  whiff  of  as  he  followed,  and 
turning  a  corner  led  the  way  to  the  side  of  a  lofty 
building  in  a  dark  street,  where  they  met  other  like 
shapes  tending  toward  it  from  different  directions. 


VIII. 

LEMUEL  entered  a  lighted  doorway  from  a  bricked 
courtyard,  and  found  himself  with  twenty  or  thirty 
houseless  comrades  in  a  large,  square  room,  with 
benching  against  the  wall  for  them  to  sit  on.  They 
were  all  silent  and  quelled-looking,  except  a  young 
fellow  whom  Lemuel  sat  down  beside,  and  who,  as 
certaining  that  he  was  a  new-comer,  seemed  disposed 
to  do  the  honours  of  the  place.  He  was  not  daunted 
by  the  reserve  native  to  Lemuel,  or  by  that  distrust 
of  strangers  which  experience  had  so  soon  taught 
him.  He  addressed  him  promptly  as  mate,  and 
told  him  that  the  high,  narrow,  three-sided  tabling 
in  the  middle  of  the  room  was  where  they  would  get 
their  breakfast,  if  they  lived. 

"And  I  guess  I  shall  live,"  he  said.  "I  notice  I 
'most  always  live  till  breakfast-time,  whatever  else  I 
do,  or  I  don't  do ;  but  sometimes  it  don't  seem  as  if 
I  could  saw  my  way  through  that  quarter -of  a  cord 
of  wood."  At  a  glance  of  inquiry  which  Lemuel 
could  not  forbear,  he  continued  :  "  What  I  mean  by 
a  quarter  of  a  cord  of  wood  is  that  they  let  you 


94  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

exercise  that  much  free  in  the  morning,  before  they 
give  you  your  breakfast :  it 's  the  doctor's  orders. 
This  used  to  be  a  school-house,  but  it 's  in  better 
business  now.  They  got  a  kitchen  under  here, 
that  beats  the  Parker  House  ;  you  '11  smell  it  pretty 
soon.  No  whacking  on  the  knuckles  here  any  more. 
All  serene,  I  tell  you.  You'll  see.  I  don't  know 
how  I  should  got  along  without  this  institution,  and 
I  tell  the  manager  so,  every  time  I  see  him.  That 's 
him,  hollering  '  Next/  out  of  that  room  there.  It 's 
a  name  he  gives  all  of  us;  he  knows  it's  a  name 
we  '11  answer  to.  Don't  you  forget  it  when  it  comes 
your  turn." 

He  was  younger  than  Lemuel,  apparently,  but 
his  swarthy,  large-mouthed,  droll  eyed  face  affirmed 
the  experience  of  a  sage.  He  wore  a  blue  flannel 
shirt,  with  loose  trousers  belted  round  his  waist,  and 
he  crushed  a  soft  felt  hat  between  his  hands;  his 
hair  was  clipped  close  to  his  skull,  and  as  he  rubbed 
it  now  and  then  it  gave  out  a  pleasant  rasping 
sound. 

The  tramps  disappeared  in  the  order  of  their 
vicinity  to  the  manager's  door,  and  it  came  in  time 
to  this  boy  and  Lemuel. 

"  You  come  along  with  me,"  he  said,  "  and  do  as  I 
do."  When  they  entered  the  presence  of  the  mana 
ger,  who  sat  at  a  desk,  Lemuel's  guide  nodded  to 
him,  and  handed  over  his  order  for  a  bed. 

"  Ever  been  here  before  ?  "  asked  the  manager,  as 
if  going  through  the  form  for  a  joke. 

" Never."     He  took  a  numbered  card  which  the 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.       95 

manager  gave  him,  and  stood  aside  to  wait  for 
Lemuel,  who  made  the  same  answer  to  the  same 
question,  and  received  his  numbered  card. 

"  Now,"  said  the  young  fellow,  as  they  passed  out 
of  another  door,  "  we  ain't  either  of  us  '  Next/  any 
more.  I  Jm  Thirty-nine,  and  you  're  Forty,  and 
don't  you  forget  it.  All  right,  boss,"  he  called 
back  to  the  manager  ;  "  I  '11  take  care  of  him  !  This 
way,"  he  said  to  Lemuel.  "  The  reason  why  I  said 
I'd  never  been  here  before,"  he  explained  on  the 
way  down,  "  was  because  you  got  to  say  something, 
when  he  asks  you.  Most  of  'em  says  last  fall  or  last 
year,  but  I  say  never,  because  it 's  just  as  true,  and 
he  seems  to  like  it  better.  We  're  going  down  to 
the  dressing-room  now,  and  then  we  're  going  to 
take  a  bath.  Do  you  know  why  1 " 

"No,"  said  Lemuel. 

"  Because  we  can't  help  it.  It 's  the  doctor's 
orders.  He  thinks  it 's  the  best  thing  you  can  do, 
just  before  you  go  to  bed." 

The  basement  was  brightly  lighted  with  gas 
everywhere,  and  a  savoury  odour  of  onion-flavoured 
broth  diffused  itself  through  the  whole  place. 

"  Smell  it  1  You  might  think  that  was  supper, 
but  it  ain't.  It 's  breakfast.  You  got  a  bath  and  a 
night's  rest  as  well  as  the  quarter  of  a  cord  of  wood 
between  you  and  that  stew.  Hungry  1 " 

"  Not  very,"  said  Lemuel  faintly. 

"Because  if  you  say  you  are  they'll  give  you 
all  the  bread  and  water  you  can  hold,  now.  But 
I  ruther  wait." 


96  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"I  guess  I  don't  want  anything  to-night,"  said 
Lemuel,  shrinking  from  the  act  of  beggary. 

"  Well,  I  guess  you  won't  lose  anything  in  the 
long  run,"  said  the  other.  "You'll  make  it  up  at 
breakfast." 

They  turned  into  a  room  where  eight  or  ten 
tramps  were  undressing ;  some  of  them  were  old 
men,  quite  sodden  and  stupefied  with  a  life  of 
vagrancy  and  privation  ;  others  were  of  a  dull  or 
cunning  middle-age,  two  or  three  were  as  young  as 
Lemuel  and  his  partner,  and  looked  as  if  they  might 
be  poor  fellows  who  had  found  themselves  in  a 
strange  city  without  money  or  work.  But  it  was 
against  them  that  they  had  known  where  to  come 
for  a  night's  shelter,  Lemuel  felt. 

There  were  large  iron  hooks  hanging  from  the 
walls  and  ceiling,  and  his  friend  found  the  numbers 
on  two  of  them  corresponding  to  those  given  Lemuel 
and  himself,  and  brass  checks  which  they  hung 
around  their  necks. 

"  You  got  to  hang  your  things  on  that  hook,  all 
but  your  shoes  and  stockings,  and  you  got  to  hang 
on  to  them,  yourself.  Forty's  your  number,  and 
forty's  your  hook,  and  they  give  you  the  clothes 
off 'n  it  in  the  morning." 

He  led  the  way  through  the  corridor  into  a  large 
room  where  a  row  of  bath-tubs  flanked  the  wall,  half 
of  them  filled  with  bathers,  who  chatted  in  tones  of 
subdued  cheerfulness  under  the  pleasant  excitement 
of  unlimited  hot  and  cold  water.  As  each  new 
comer  appeared,  a  black  boy,  perched  on  a  window- 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.   97 

sill,  jumped  down  and  dashed  his  head  from  a  large 
bottle  which  he  carried. 

"Free  shampoo,"  explained  Lemuel's  mate. 
"  Doctor's  orders.  Only  you  have  to  do  the  rubbing 
yourself.  I  don't  suppose  you  need  it,  but  some 
the  pardners  here  couldn't  sleep  without  it,"  he 
continued,  as  Lemuel  shrank  a  little  from  the  bottle, 
and  then  submitted.  "  It 's  a  regular  night-cap." 

The  tramps  recognised  the  humour  of  the  ex 
planation  by  a  laugh,  intended  to  be  respectful  to 
the  establishment  in  its  control,  which  spread  along 
their  line,  and  the  black  boy  grinned. 

"There  ain't  anything  mean  about  the  Wayfarer's 
Hotel,"  said  the  mate,  and  they  all  laughed  again,  a 
little  louder. 

Each  man,  having  dried  himself  from  his  bath, 
was  given  a  coarse  linen  night-gown ;  sometimes  it 
was  not  quite  whole,  but  it  was  always  clean ;  and 
then  he  gathered  up  his  shoes  and  stockings  and 
went  out. 

"Hold  on  a  minute,"  said  the  mate  to  Lemuel, 
when  they  left  the  bath-room.  "You  ought  to  see 
the  kitchen,"  and  in  his  night-gown,  with  his  shoes 
in  his  hand,  he  led  Lemuel  to  the  open  door  which 
that  delicious  smell  of  broth  came  from.  A  vast 
copper-topped  boiler  was  bubbling  within,  and  trying 
to  get  its  lid  off.  The  odour  made  Lemuel  sick  with 
hunger. 

"  Refrigerator  in  the  next  room,"  the  mate 
lectured  on.  "  Best  beef-chucks  in  the  market ;  fish 
for  Fridays — we  don't  make  any  man  go  against  his 
G 


98  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

religion,  in  this  house  ;  pots  of  butter  as  big  as  a 
cheese, — none  of  your  oleomargarine, — the  real 
thing,  every  time  ;  potatoes  and  onions  and  carrots 
laying  around  on  the  floor ;  barrels  of  hard-tack ; 
and  bread,  like  sponge,  — bounce  you  up  if  you  was 
to  jump  on  it, — baked  by  the  women  at  the  Chardon 
Street  Home — oh,  I  tell  you  we  do  things  in  style 
here." 

A  man  who  sat  reading  a  newspaper  in  the  cor 
ner  looked  up  sharply.  "  Hello,  there  !  what 's 
wanted  1 " 

"Just  dropped  in  to  wish  you  good  night,  Jimmy," 
said  Lemuel's  mate. 

"  You  clear  out !  "  said  the  man  good-humouredly, 
as  if  to  an  old  acquaintance,  who  must  not  be  allowed 
to  presume  upon  his  familiarity. 

"All  right,  Jimmy,"  said  the  boy.  He  set  his 
left  hand  horizontally  on  its  wrist  at  his  left  shoulder 
and  cut  the  air  with  it  in  playful  menace  as  the  man 
dropped  his  eyes  again  to  his  paper.  "  They  're  all 
just  so,  in  this  house,"  he  explained  to  Lemuel. 
"  No  nonsense,  but  good-natured.  They  yre  all  right. 
They  know  me." 

He  mounted  two  flights  of  stairs  in  front  of  Lemuel 
to  a  corridor,  where  an  attendant  stood  examining  the 
numbers  on  the  brass  checks  hung  around  tramps' 
necks  as  they  came  up  with  their  shoes  in  their 
hands.  He  instructed  them  that  the  numbers  corre 
sponded  to  the  cots  they  were  to  occupy,  as  well  as 
the  hooks  where  their  clothes  hung.  Some  of  them 
seemed  hardly  able  to  master  the  facts.  They  looked 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.       99 

wistfully,  like  cowed  animals,  into  his  face  as  he 
made  the  case  clear. 

Two  vast  rooms,  exquisitely  clean,  like  the  whole 
house,  opened  on  the  right  and  left  of  the  corridor, 
and  presented  long  phalanxes  of  cots,  each  furnished 
with  two  coarse  blankets,  a  quilt,  and  a  thin  pillow. 

"Used  to  be  school-rooms,"  said  Lemuel's  mate, 
in  a  low  tone. 

"  Cots  thirty-nine  and  forty,"  said  the  attendant, 
looking  at  their  checks.  "  Right  over  there,  in  the 
corner." 

"  Come  along,"  said  the  mate,  leading  the  way, 
with  the  satisfaction  of  an  habitud.  4  Best  berth  in 
the  room,  and  about  the  last  they  reach  in  the 
morning.  You  see,  they  got  to  take  us  as  we 
come,  when  they  call  us,  and  the  last  feller  in  at 
night 's  the  first  feller  out  in  the  morning,  because 
his  bed 's  the  nearest  the  door." 

He  did  not  pull  down  the  blankets  of  his  cot  at 
once,  but  stretched  himself  out  in  the  quilt  that 
covered  them.  "  Cool  off  a  little,  first,"  he  explained. 
"  Well,  this  is  what  I  call  comfort,  mate,  heigh  1 " 

Lemuel  did  not  answer.  He  was  watching  the 
attendant  with  a  group  of  tramps  who  could  not  find 
their  cots. 

"  Can't  read,  I  suppose,"  said  the  mate,  a  little  dis 
dainfully.  "  Well,  look  at  that  old  chap,  will  you  ! " 
A  poor  fellow  was  fumbling  with  his  blankets,  as  if 
he  did  not  know  quite  how  to  manage  them.  The 
attendant  had  to  come  to  his  help,  and  tuck  him  in. 
"  Well,  there  ! "  exclaimed  the  mate,  lifting  himself 


100  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

on  his  elbow  to  admire  the  scene.  "  I  don't  suppose 
he's  ever  been  in  a  decent  bed  before.  Hayloft's 
his  style,  or  a  board-pile."  He  sank  down  again,  and 
went  on  :  "  Well,  you  do  see  all  kinds  of  folks  here, 
that 's  a  fact.  Sorry  there  ain't  more  in  to-night, 
so 's  to  give  you  a  specimen.  You  ought  to  be  here 
in  the  winter.  Well,  it  ain't  so  lonesome  now,  in 
summer,  as  it  used  to  be.  Sometimes  I  used  to  have 
nearly  the  whole  place  to  myself,  summer  nights, 
before  they  got  to  passin'  these  laws  against  tramps 
in  the  country,  and  lockin'  'em  up  when  they  ketched 
'em.  That  drives  'em  into  the  city  summers,  now ; 
because  they  're  always  sure  of  a  night's  rest  and  a 
day's  board  here  if  they  ask  for  it.  But  winter's 
the  time.  You  '11  see  all  these  cots  full,  then.  They 
let  on  the  steam-heat,  and  it 's  comfortable  ;  and  it 's 
always  airy  and  healthy."  The  vast  room  was,  in 
fact,  perfectly  ventilated,  and  the  poor  who  housed 
themselves  that  night,  and  many  well-to-do  sojourners 
in  hotels,  had  reason  to  envy  the  vagrants  their  free 
lodging. 

The  mate  now  got  under  his  quilt,  and  turned  his 
face  toward  Lemuel,  with  one  hand  under  his  cheek. 
"  They  don't  let  everyloody  into  this  room,  's  I  was 
tellin'  ye.  This  room  is  for  the  big-bugs,  you  know. 
Sometimes  a  drunk  will  get  in,  though,  in  spite  of 
everything.  Why,  I  've  seen  a  drunk  at  the  station- 
house,  when  I  've  been  gettin'  my  order  for  a  bed, 
stiffen  up  so 't  the  captain  himself  thought  he  was 
sober;  and  then  I've  followed  him  round  here, 
wobblin'  and  corkscrewin'  all  over  the  sidewalk  ;  and 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     101 

then  I  Ve  seen  him  stiffen  np  in  the  office  again,  and 
go  through  his  bath  like  a  little  man,  and  get  into 
bed  as  drunk  as  a  fish  ;  and  may  be  wake  up  in  the 
night  with  the  man  with  the  poker  after  him,  and 
make  things  hum.  Well,  sir,  one  night  there  was  a 
drunk  in  here  that  thought  the  man  with  the  poker 
was  after  him,  and  he  just  up  and  jumped  out  of 
this  window  behind  you — three  stories  from  the 
ground." 

Lemuel  could  not  help  lifting  himself  in  bed  to 
look  at  it.  "  Did  it  kill  him  1 "  he  asked. 

"  Kill  him  1  No !  You  can't  kill  a  drunk.  One 
night  there  was  a  drunk  got  loose,  here,  and  he  run 
downstairs  into  the  wood-yard,  and  he  got  hold  of 
an  axe  down  there,  and  it  took  five  men  to  get  that 
axe  away  from  that  drunk.  He  was  goin'  for  the 
snakes." 

"The  snakes,"  repeated  Lemuel.  "Are  there 
snakes  in  the  wood  -yard  1 " 

The  other  gave  a  laugh  so  loud  that  the  attendant 
called  out,  "Less  noise  over  there  ! " 

"I'll  tell  you  about  the  snakes  in  the  morning," 
said  the  mate ;  and  he  turned  his  face  away  from 
Lemuel. 

The  stories  of  the  drunks  had  made  Lemuel  a 
little  anxious  ;  but  he  thought  that  attendant  would 
keep  a  sharp  lookout,  so  that  there  would  not  really 
be  much  danger.  He  was  very  drowsy  from  his 
bath,  in  spite  of  the  hunger  that  tormented  him,  but 
he  tried  to  keep  awake  and  think  what  he  should  do 
after  breakfast. 


IX. 


"  COME,  turn  out  ! "  said  a  voice  in  his  ear,  and  he 
started  up,  to  see  the  great  dormitory  where  he  had 
fallen  asleep  empty  of  all  but  himself  and  his  friend. 

"  Make  out  a  night's  rest  1 "  asked  the  latter. 
"  Didn't  I  tell  you  we  'd  be  the  last  up  ?  Come 
along  !  "  He  preceded  Lemuel,  still  drowsy,  down 
the  stairs  into  the  room  where  they  had  undressed, 
and  where  the  tramps  were  taking  each  his  clothes 
from  their  hook,  and  hustling  them  on. 

"  What  time  is  it,  Johnny  1 "  asked  Lemuel's  mate 
of  the  attendant.  "I  left  my  watch  under  my 
pillow." 

"  Five  o'clock,"  said  the  man,  helping  the  poor  old 
fellow  who  had  not  known  how  to  get  into  bed  to 
put  on  his  clothes. 

"  Well,  that 's  a  pretty  good  start,"  said  the  other. 
He  finished  his  toilet  by  belting  himself  around  the 
waist,  and  "  Come  along,  mate,"  he  said  to  Lemuel. 
"I  '11  show  you  the  way  to  the  tool-room." 

He  led  him  through  the  corridor  into  a  chamber 
of  the  basement  where  there  were  bright  rows  of 

wood-saws,   and  ranks  of  saw-horses,  with  heaps  of 
102 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     103 

the  latter  in  different  stages  of  construction.  "  House 
self-supporting,  as  far  as  it  can.  We  don't  want  to 
be  beholden  to  anybody  if  we  can  help  it.  We 
make  our  own  horses  here ;  but  we  can't  make  our 
saws,  or  we  would.  Ever  had  much  practice  with 
the  wood-saw  ? " 

"  No,"  said  Lemuel,  with  a  throb  of  home-sickness, 
that  brought  back  the  hacked  log  behind  the  house, 
and  the  axe  resting  against  it ;  "  we  always  chopped 
our  stove-wood." 

"Yes,  that's  the  way  in  the  country.  Well,  now," 
said  the  other,  "  I  '11  show  you  how  to  choose  a  saw. 
Don't  you  be  took  in  by  no  new  saw  because  it 's 
bright,  and  looks  pretty.  You  want  to  take  a  saw 
that 's  been  filed,  and  filed  away  till  it  ain't  more  'n 
an  inch  and  a  half  deep ;  and  then  you  want  to  tune 
it  up,  just  so, — like  a  banjo — not  too  tight,  and  not 
too  slack, — and  then  it'll  slip  through  a  stick  o' 
wood  like — lyin'."  He  selected  a  saw,  and  put  it  in 
order  for  Lemuel.  "  There  !  "  He  picked  out  another. 
"  Here 's  my  old  stand-by  !  "  He  took  up  a  saw-horse, 
at  random,  to  indicate  that  one  need  not  be  critical 
in  that,  and  led  through  the  open  door  into  the 
wood-yard,  where  a  score  or  two  of  saws  were  already 
shrilling  and  wheezing  through  the  wood. 

It  was  a  wide  and  lofty  shed,  with  piles  of  cord- 
wood  and  slabs  at  either  end,  and  walled  on  the 
farther  side  with  kindling,  sawed,  split,  and  piled  up 
with  admirable  neatness.  The  place^  gave  out  the 
sweet  smell  of  the  woods  from  the  bark  of  the  logs 
and  from  the  fresh  section  of  their  grain.  A  double 


104  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;   OR, 

rank  of  saw-horses  occupied  the  middle  space,  and 
beside  each  horse  lay  a  quarter  of  a  cord  of  wood,  at 
which  the  men  were  toiling  in  sullen  silence  for  the 
most  part,  only  exchanging  a  grunt  or  snarl  of  dis 
satisfaction  with  one  another. 

"Morning,  mates,"  said  Lemuel's  friend  cheerfully, 
as  he  entered  the  shed,  and  put  his  horse  down 
beside  one  of  the  piles.  "  Thought  we  'd  look  in 
and  see  how  you  was  gettin'  along.  Just  stepped 
round  from  the  Parker  House  while  our  breakfast 
was  a-cookin'.  Hope  you  all  rested  well  ? " 

The  men  paused,  with  their  saws  at  different 
slopes  in  the  wood,  and  looked  round.  The  night 
before,  in  the  nakedness  in  which  Lemuel  had  first 
seen  them,  the  worst  of  them  had  the  inalienable 
comeliness  of  nature,  and  their  faces,  softened  by 
their  relation  to  their  bodies,  were  not  so  bad ;  they 
were  not  so  bad,  looking  from  their  white  night 
gowns;  but  now,  clad  in  their  filthy  rags,  and 
caricatured  out  of  all  native  dignity  by  their  motley 
and  misshapen  attire,  they  were  a  hideous  gang,  and 
all  the  more  hideous  for  the  grin  that  overspread 
their  stubbly  muzzles  at  the  boy's  persiflage. 

"Don't  let  me  interrupt  you,  fellows,"  he  said, 
flinging  a  log  upon  his  horse,  and  dashing  his  saw 
gaily  into  it.  "  Don't  mind  me  !  I  know  you  hate 
to  lose  a  minute  of  this  fun ;  I  understand  just  how 
you  feel  about  it,  and  I  don't  want  you  to  stand  upon 
ceremony  with  me.  Treat  me  just  like  one  of  your 
selves,  gents.  This  beech- wood  is  the  regular  Nova 
Scotia  thing,  ain't  it  1  Tough  and  knotty  1  I  can't 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  105 

bear  any  of  your  cheap  wood-lot  stuff  from  around 
here,  What  I  want  is  Nova  Scotia  wood,  every 
time.  Then  I  feel  that  I  'm  gettin'  the  worth  of  my 
money."  His  log  dropped  apart  on  each  side  of  his 
horse,  and  he  put  on  another.  "Well,  mates,"  he 
rattled  on,  "  this  is  lovely,  ain't  it  1  I  wouldn't  give 
up  my  little  quarter  of  a  cord  of  green  Nova  Scotia 
before  breakfast  for  anything ;  I  've  got  into  the  way 
of  it,  and  I  can't  live  without  it." 

The  tramps  chuckled  at  these  ironies,  and  the 
attendant  who  looked  into  the  yard  now  and  then 
did  not  interfere  with  them. 

The  mate  went  through  his  stint  as  rapidly  as  he 
talked,  and  he  had  nearly  finished  before  Lemuel 
had  half  done.  He  did  not  offer  to  help  him,  but 
he  delayed  the  remnant  of  his  work,  and  waited  for 
him  to  catch  up,  talking  all  the  while  with  gay 
volubility,  joking  this  one  and  that,  and  keeping  the 
whole  company  as  cheerful  as  it  was  in  their  dull, 
sodden  nature  to  be.  He  had  a  floating  eye  that 
harmonised  with  his  queer,  mobile  face,  and  played 
round  on  the  different  figures,  but  mostly  upon 
Lemuel's  dogged,  rustic  industry  as  if  it  really 
amused  him. 

"  What 's  your  lay,  after  breakfast  ? "  he  asked,  as 
they  came  to  the  last  log  together. 

"  Lay  ? "  repeated  Lemuel, 

"  What  you  goin'  to  do  1 " 

"  I  don't  know ;  I  can't  tell  yet-" 

"You  know,"  said  the  other,  "you  can  come  back 
here,  and  get  your  dinner,  if  you  want  to  saw  wood 


106  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

for  it  from  ten  till  twelve,  and  you  get  your  supper 
if  you  '11  saw  from  five  to  six." 

"Are  you  going  to  do  that?"  asked  Lemuel 
cautiously. 

"  No,  sir,"  said  the  other ;  "  I  can't  spare  the  time. 
I  'm  goin'  to  fill  up  for  all  day,  at  breakfast,  and 
then  I  'm  goin'  up  to  lay  round  on  the  Common  till 
it 's  time  to  go  to  the  Police  Court ;  and  when  that 's 
over  I  'in  goin'  back  to  the  Common  ag'in,  and  lay 
round  the  rest  of  the  day.  I  hain't  got  any  leisure 
for  no  such  nonsense  as  wood-sawin'.  I  don't  mind 
the  work,  but  I  hate  to  waste  the  time.  It 's  the 
way  with  most  o'  the  pardners,  unless  it 's  the  green 
hands.  That  so,  pards  1 " 

Some  of  them  had  already  gone  in  to  breakfast ; 
the  smell  of  the  stew  came  out  to  the  wood-yard 
through  the  open  door.  Lemuel  and  his  friend 
finished  their  last  stick  at  the  same  time,  and  went 
in  together,  and  found  places  side  by  side  at  the 
table  in  the  waiting-room.  The  attendant  within  its 
oblong  was  serving  the  men  with  heavy  quart  bowls 
of  the  steaming  broth.  He  brought  half  a  loaf  of 
•light,  elastic  bread  with  each,  and  there  were  platters 
of  hard-tack  set  along  the  board,  which  every  one 
helped  himself  from  freely,  and  broke  into  his  broth. 

"Morning,  Jimmy,"  said  the  mate,  as  the  man 
brought  him  and  Lemuel  their  portions.  "  I  hate  to 
have  the  dining-room  chairs  off  a  paintin'  when 
there's  so  much  style  about  everything  else,  and 
I've  got  a  visitor  with  me.  But  I  tell  him  he'll 
have  to  take  us  as  he  finds  us,  and  stand  it  this 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  107 

He  wasted  no  more  words  on  his  joke, 
but  plunging  his  large  tin  spoon  into  his  bowl,  kept 
his  breath  to  cool  his  broth,  blowing  upon  it  with 
easy  grace,  and  swallowing  it  at  a  tremendous  rate, 
though  Lemuel,  after  following  his  example,  still 
found  it  so  hot  that  it  brought  the  tears  into  his 
eyes.  It  was  delicious,  and  he  was  ravenous  from 
his  twenty-four  hours'  fast,  but  his  companion  was 
scraping  the  bottom  of  his  bowl  before  Lemuel  had 
got  half-way  down,  and  he  finished  his  second  as 
Lemuel  finished  his  first. 

"  Just  oncet  more  for  both  of  us,  Jimmy,"  he  said, 
pushing  his  bowl  across  the  board;  and  when  the 
man  brought  them  back  he  said,  "Now,  I'm  goin' 
to  take  it  easy  and  enjoy  myself.  I  can't  never 
seem  to  get  the  good  of  it,  till  about  the  third  or 
fourth  bowl.  Too  much  of  a  hurry." 

"  Do  they  give  you  four  bowls  ?  "  gasped  Lemuel 
in  astonishment. 

"  They  give  you  four  barrels,  if  you  can  hold  it," 
replied  the  other  proudly  ;  "  and  some  the  mates 
can,  pretty  near.  They  got  an  awful  tank,  as  a 
general  rule,  the  pards  has.  There  ain't  anything 
mean  about  this  house.  They  don't  scamp  the 
broth,  and  they  don't  shab  the  measure.  I  do  wish 
you  could  see  that  refrigerator,  oncet.  Never  been 
much  at  sea,  have  you,  mate  1 " 

Lemuel  said  he  had  never  been  at  sea  at  all. 

The  other  leaned  forward  with  his  elbows  on  each 
side  of  his  bowl,  and  lazily  broke  his  hard-tack  into 
it.  "Well,  I  have.  I  was  shipped  when  I  was 


108  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

about  eleven  years  old  by  a  shark  that  got  me  drunk. 
I  wanted  to  ship,  but  I  wanted  to  ship  on  an 
American  vessel  for  New  Orleans.  First  thing  I 
knowed  I  turned  up  on  a  Swedish  brig  bound  for 
Venice.  Ever  been  to  It'ly  ?  " 

"No,"  said  Lemuel. 

"  Well,  I  hain't  but  oncet.  Oncet  is  enough  for 
me.  I  run  away,  while  I  was  in  Venice,  and  went 
ashore — if  you  can  call  it  ashore ;  it 's  all  water,  and 
you  got  to  go  round  in  boats  :  gondolas  they  call 
'em  there — and  went  to  see  the  American  counsul, 
and  told  him  I  was  an  American  boy,  and  tried  to 
get  him  to  get  me  off.  But  he  couldn't  do  anything. 
If  you  ship  under  the  Swedish  flag  you  're  a  Swede, 
and  the  whole  United  States  couldn't  get  you  off. 
If  I'd  'a'  shipped  under  the  American  flag  I'd  'a' 
been  an  American,  I  don't  care  if  I  was  born  in 
Hottentot.  That 's  what  the  counsul  said.  I  never 
want  to  see  that  town  ag'in.  I  used  to  hear  songs 
about  Venice — '  Beautiful  Venice,  Bride  of  the  Sea ; ' 
but  I  think  it's  a  kind  of  a  hole  of  a  place.  Well, 
what  I  started  to  say  was  that  when  I  turn  up  in 
Boston,  now, — and  I  most  generally  do, — I  don't  go 
to  no  sailor  boardin'-house ;  I  break  for  the  Wayfarer's 
Lodge,  every  time.  It's  a  temperance  house,  and 
they  give  you  the  worth  o'  your  money." 

"Come!  Hurry  up!"  said  the  attendant.  He 
wiped  the  table  impatiently  with  his  towel,  and 
stood  waiting  for  Lemuel  and  the  other  to  finish. 
All  the  rest  had  gone. 

"Don't  you  be  too  fresh,  pard,"  said  the  mate, 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     109 

with  the  effect  of  standing  upon  his  rights.  "  Guess 
if  you  was  on  your  third  bowl,  you  wouldn't  hurry." 

The  attendant  smiled..  "  Don't  you  want  to  lend 
us  a  hand  with  the  dishes  1 "  he  asked. 

"  Who  '&  sick  ? "  asked  the  other  in  his  turn. 

"Johnny's  got  a  day  off." 

The  boy  shook  his  head.  "No;  I  couldn't.  If 
it  was  a  case  of  sickness,  of  course  I  'd  do  it.  But  I 
couldn't  spare  the  time ;  I  couldn't  really.  Why,  I 
ought  to  be  up  on  the  Common  now." 

Lemuel  had  listened  with  a  face  of  interest. 

"Don't  you  want  to  make  half  a  dollar,  young 
feller  ? "  asked  the  attendant. 

"Yes,  I  do,"  said  Lemuel  eagerly. 

"  Know  how  to  wash  dishes  1 " 

"Yes,"  answered  the  boy,  not  ashamed  of  his 
knowledge,  as  the  boy  of  another  civilisation  might 
have  been.  Nothing  more  distinctly  marks  the 
rustic  New  England  civilisation  than  the  taming  of 
its  men  to  the  performance  of  certain  domestic 
offices  elsewhere  held  dishonourably  womanish. 
The  boy  learns  not  only  to  milk  and  to  keep  the 
milk  cans  clean,  but  to  churn,  to  wash  dishes,  and 
to  cook. 

"  Come  around  here,  then,"  said  the  attendant, 
and  Lemuel  promptly  obeyed. 

"Well,  now,"  said  his  mate,  "that's  right.  I'd 
do  it  myself,  if  I  had  the  time."  He  pulled  his  soft 
wool  hat  out  of  his  hip  pocket.  "  Well,  good  morn 
ing,  pards.  I  don't  know  as  I  shall  see  you  again 
much  before  night."  Lemuel  was  lifting  a  large 


110  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;   OR, 

tray,  heavy  with  empty  broth-bowls.  "  What  time 
did  you  say  it  was,  Jimmy  1 " 

11  Seven  o'clock." 

"  Well,  I  just  got  time  to  get  there,"  said  the  other, 
putting  on  his  hat,  and  pushing  out  of  the  door. 

At  the  moment  Lemuel  was  lifting  his  tray  of 
empty  broth-bowls,  Mr.  Sewell  was  waking  for  the 
early  quarter-to-eight  breakfast,  which  he  thought 
it  right  to  make — not  perhaps  as  an  example  to  his 
parishioners,  most  of  whom  had  the  leisure  to  lie 
later,  but  as  a  sacrifice,  not  too  definite,  to  the 
lingering  ideal  of  suffering.  He  could  not  work 
before  breakfast — his  delicate  digestion  forbade 
that — or  he  would  have  risen  still  earlier  -}  and  he 
employed  the  twenty  minutes  he  had  between  his  bath 
and  his  breakfast  in  skimming  the  morning  paper. 

Just  at  present  Mr.  Sewell  was  taking  two  morn 
ing  papers :  the  Advertiser  which  he  had  always 
taken,  and  a  cheap  little  one-cent  paper,  which  had 
just  been  started,  and  which  he  had  subscribed  for 
experimentally,  with  the  vague  impression  that  he 
ought  to  encourage  the  young  men  who  had  estab 
lished  it.  He  did  not  like  it  very  well.  It  was 
made  up  somewhat  upon  the  Western  ideal,  and 
dealt  with  local  matters  in  a  manner  that  was  at 
once  a  little  more  lively  and  a  little  more  intimate 
than  he  had  been  used  to.  But  before  he  had  quite 
made  up  his  mind  to  stop  it,  his  wife  had  come 
to  like  it  on  that  very  account.  She  said  it  was 
interesting.  On  this  point  she  used  her  conscience 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  Ill 

a  little  less  actively  than  usual,  and  he  had  to  make 
her  observe  that  to  be  interesting  was  not  the  whole 
duty  of  journalism.  It  had  become  a  matter  of 
personal  pride  with  them  respectively  to  attack  and 
defend  The  Sunrise, -as  I  shall  call  the  little  sheet, 
though  that  was  not  the  name  ;  and  Mr.  Sewell  had 
lately  made  some  gain  through  the  character  of 
the  police  reports,  which  The  Sunrise  had  been 
developing  into  a  feature.  It  was  not  that  offensive 
matters  were  introduced ;  the  worst  cases  were  in 
fact  rather  blinked,  but  Sewell  insisted  that  the  tone 
of  flippant  gaiety  with  which  many  facts,  so  serious, 
so  tragic  for  their  perpetrators  and  victims,  were 
treated  was  odious.  He  objected  to  the  court  being 
called  a  Mill,  and  prisoners  Grists,  and  the  procedure 
Grinding ;  he  objected  to  the  familiar  name  of  Uncle 
for  the  worthy  gentleman  to  whose  care  certain 
offenders  were  confided  on  probation.  He  now  read 
that  department  of  The  Sunrise  the  first  thing 
every  morning,  in  the  hope  of  finding  something 
with  which  to  put  Mrs.  Sewell  hopelessly  in  the 
wrong,  but  this  morning  a  heading  in  the  foreign 
news  of  the  Advertiser  caught  his  eye,  and  he 
laid  The  Sunrise  aside  to  read  at  the  breakfast- 
table.  His  wife  came  down  in  a  cotton  dress,  as  a 
tribute  to  the  continued  warmth  of  the  weather,  and 
said  that  she  had  not  called  the  children,  because  it 
was  Saturday,  and  they  might  as  well  have  their 
sleep  out.  He  liked  to  see  her  in  that  dress  ;  it  had 
a  leafy  rustling  that  was  pleasant  to  his  ear,  and  as 
she  looked  into  the  library  he  gaily  put  out  his 


112  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

hand,  which  she  took,  and  suffered  herself  to  be 
drawn  toward  him.  Then  she  gave  him  a  kiss, 
somewhat  less  business-like  and  preoccupied  than 
usual. 

"  Well,  you  Ve  got  Lemuel  Barker  off  your  mind 
at  last,"  she  divined,  in  recognition  of  her  husband's 
cheerfulness. 

"Yes,  he  's  off,"  admitted  Sewell. 

"  I  hope  he  '11  stay  in  Willoughby  Pastures  after 
this.  Of  course  it  puts  an  end  to  our  going  there 
next  summer." 

"  Oh,  I  don't  know,"  Sewell  feebly  demurred. 

"/do,"  said  his  wife,  but  not  despising  his  insin 
cerity  enough  to  insist  that  he  did  also.  The  mellow 
note  of  an  apostle's  bell — the  gift  of  an  aesthetic 
parishioner — came  from  below,  and  she  said,  "  Well, 
there  's  breakfast,  David,"  and  went  before  him  down 
the  stairs. 

He  brought  his  papers  with  him.  It  would  have 
been  her  idea  of  heightened  cosiness,  at  this  break 
fast,  which  they  had  once  a  week  alone  together,  not 
to  have  the  newspapers,  but  she  saw  that  he  felt 
differently,  and  after  a  number  of  years  of  married 
life  a  woman  learns  to  let  her  husband  have  his  own 
way  in  some  unimportant  matters.  It  was  so  much 
his  nature  to  have  some  sort  of  reading  always  in 
hand,  that  he  was  certainly  more  himself,  and  perhaps 
more  companionable  with  his  papers  than  without 
them. 

She  merely  said,  "  Let  me  take  the  Sunrise" 
when  she  had  poured  out  his  coffee,  and  he  had 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  113 

helped  her  to  cantaloupe  and  steak,  and  spread 
his  Advertiser  beside  his  plate.  He  had  the  Sunrise 
in  his  lap. 

"No,  you  may  have  the  Advertiser"  he  said, 
handing  it  over  the  table  to  her.  "I  was  down 
first,  and  I  got  both  the  papers.  I'm  not  really 
obliged  to  make  any  division,  but  I  've  seen  the 
Advertiser,  and  I  'm  willing  to  behave  unselfishly. 
If  you  're  very  impatient  for  the  police  report  in  the 
Sunrise  I'll  read  it  aloud  for  you.  I  think  that 
will  be  a  very  good  test  of  its  quality,  don't  you  1  " 

He  opened  the  little  sheet,  and  smiled  teasingly 
at  his  wife,  who  said,  "  Yes,  read  it  aloud  ;  I  'm  not 
at  all  ashamed  of  it." 

She  put  the  Advertiser  in  her  lap,  and  leaned 
defiantly  forward,  while  she  stirred  her  coffee,  and 
Sewell  unfolded  the  little  sheet,  and  glanced  up  and 
down  its  columns.  "  Go  on  !  If  you  can't  find  it, 
I  can." 

"  Never  mind !  Here  it  is,"  said  Sewell,  and  he 
began  to  read — 

" '  The  mill  opened  yesterday  morning  with  a 
smaller  number  of  grists  than  usual,  but  they  made 
up  in  quality  what  they  lacked  in  quantity.' 

"  Our  friend's  metaphor  seems  to  have  weakened 
under  him  a  little,"  commented  Sewell,  and  then  he 
pursued — 

'"A  reasonable  supply  of  drunks  were  de 
spatched ' 

"  Come,  now,  Lucy !  You  '11  admit  that  this  is 
horrible  1 "  he  broke  off. 


114  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

"No,"  said  his  wife,  "  I  will  admit  nothing  of  the 
kind.  It 's  flippant,.  I  '11  allow.  Go  on  ! " 

"  I  can't,"  said  Sewell ;  but  he  obeyed. 

"  '  A  reasonable  supply  of  drunks  were  despatched, 
and  an  habitual  drunk,  in  the  person  of  a  -burly 
dame  from  Tipperary,  who  pleaded  not  guilty  and 
then  urged  the  "poor  childer"  in  extenuation,  was 
sent  down  the  harbour  for  three  months  ;  Uncle 
Cook  had  been  put  in  charge  of  a  couple  of  young 
frailties  whose  hind  name  was  woman ' 

"  How  do  you  like  that,  my  dear  1 "  asked  Sewell 
exultantly. 

Mrs.  Sewell  looked  grave,  and  then  burst  into  a 
shocked  laugh.  "  You  must  stop  that  paper,  David  ! 
I  can't  have  it  about  for  the  children  to  get  hold  of. 
But  it  is  funny,  isn't  it  1  That  will  do " 

"  No,  I  think  you  'd  better  have  it  all,  now.  There 
can't  be  anything  worse.  It 's  funny,  yes,  with  that 
truly  infernal  drollery  which  the  newspaper  wits 
seem  to  have  the  art  of."  He  read  on — 

" c  when  a  case  was  called  that  brought  the 

breath  of  clover  blossoms  and  hay-seed  into  the 
sultry  court-room,  and  warmed  the  cockles  of  the 
habitue's'  toughened  pericardiums  with  a  touch  of  real 
poetry.  This  was  a  case  of  assault,  with  intent  to 
rob,  in  which  a  lithe  young  blonde,  answering  to  the 
good  old  Puritanic  name  of  Statira  Dudley,  was  the 
complainant,  and  the  defendant  an  innocent-looking, 
bucolic  youth,  yclept ' " 

Sewell  stopped  and  put  his  hand  to  his  fore 
head. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  115 

"  What  is  it,  David  ? "  demanded  his  wife.  "  Why 
don't  you  go  on  1  Is  it  too  scandalous  1 " 

"  No,  no,"  murmured  the  minister. 

"Welir 

"  I  can't  go  on.  But  you  must  read  it,  Lucy," 
he  said,  in  quite  a  passion  of  humility.  "And 
you  must  try  to  be  merciful.  That  poor  boy — 
that— 

He  handed  the  paper  to  his  wife,  and  made  no 
attempt  to  escape  from  judgment,  but  sat  submissive 
while  she  read  the  report  of  Lemuel's  trial.  The 
story  was  told  throughout  in  the  poetico-j  ocular 
spirit  of  the  opening  sentences  ;  the  reporter  had 
felt  the  simple  charm  of  the  affair,  only  to  be  ashamed 
of  it  and  the  more  offensive  about  it. 

When  she  had  finished  Mrs.  Sewell  did  not  say 
anything.  She  merely  looked  at  her  husband,  who 
looked  really  sick. 

At  last  he  said,  making  an  effort  to  rise  from  his 
chair,  "  I  must  go  and  see  him,  I  suppose." 

"  Yes,  if  you  can  find  him,"  responded  his  wife, 
with  a  sigh. 

"  Find  him  ?  "  echoed  Sewell. 

"  Yes.  Goodness  knows  what  more  trouble  the 
wretched  creature  's  got  into  by  this  time.  You  saw 
that  he  was  acquitted,  didn't  you  ? "  she  demanded, 
in  answer  to  her  husband's  stare. 

"  No,  I  didn't.  I  supposed  he  was  convicted,  of 
course." 

"  Well,  you  see  it  isn't  so  bad  as  it  might  be,"  she 
said,  using  a  pity  which  she  did  not  perhaps  alto- 


116  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

gether  feel.  "Eat  your  breakfast  now,  David,  and 
then  go  and  try  to  look  him  up." 

"  Oh,  I  don't  want  any  breakfast,"  pleaded  the 
minister. 

He  offered  to  rise  again,  but  she  motioned  him 
down  in  his  chair.  "David,  you  shall!  I'm  not 
going  to  have  you  going  about  all  day  with  a  head 
ache.  Eat !  And  then  when  you  Ve  finished  your 
breakfast,  go  and  find  out  which  station  that  officer 
Baker  belongs  to,  and  he  can  tell  you  something 
about  the  boy,  if  any  one  can." 

Sewell  made  what  shift  he  could  to  grasp  these 
practical  ideas,  and  he  obediently  ate  of  whatever 
his  wife  bade  him.  She  would  not  let  him  hurry 
his  breakfast  in  the  least,  and  when  he  had  at  last 
finished,  she  said,  "Now  you  can  go,  David.  And 
when  you  've  found  the  boy,  don't  you  let  him  out 
of  your  sight  again  till  you  Ve  put  him  aboard  the 
train  for  Willoughby  Pastures,  and  seen  the  train 
start  out  of  the  depot  with  him.  Never  mind  your 
sermon.  I  will  be  setting  down  the  heads  of  a 
sermon,  while  you  're  gone,  that  will  do  you  good, 
if  you  write  it  out,  whether  it  helps  any  one  else  or 
not." 

Sewell  was  not  so  sure  of  that.  He  had  no  doubt 
that  his  wife  would  set  down  the  heads  of  a  powerful 
sermon,  but  he  questioned  whether  any  discourse, 
however  potent,  would  have  force  to  benefit  such  an 
abandoned  criminal  as  he  felt  himself,  in  walking 
down  his  brown-stone  steps,  and  up  the  long  brick 
sidewalk  of  Bolingbroke  Street  toward  the  Public 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     117 

Garden.  The  beds  of  geraniums  and  the  clumps  of 
scarlet-blossomed  salvia  in  the  little  grass-plots  be 
fore  the  houses,  which  commonly  flattered  his  eye 
with  their  colour,  had  a  suggestion  of  penal  fires  in 
them  now,  that  needed  no  lingering  superstition  in 
his  nerves  to  realise  something  very  like  perdition 
for  his  troubled  soul.  It  was  not  wickedness  he  had 
been  guilty  of,  but  he  had  allowed  a  good  man  to  be 
made  the  agency  of  suffering,  and  he  was  sorely  to 
blame,  for  he  had  sinned  against  himself.  This  was 
what  his  conscience  said,  and  though  his  reason  pro 
tested  against  his  state  of  mind  as  a  phase  of  the 
religious  insanity  which  we  have  all  inherited  in 
some  measure  from  Puritan  times,  it  could  not  help 
him.  He  went  along  involuntarily  framing  a  vow 
that  if  Providence  would  mercifully  permit  him  to 
repair  the  wrong  he  had  done,  he  would  not  stop  at 
any  sacrifice  to  get  that  unhappy  boy  back  to  his 
home,  but  would  gladly  take  any  open  shame  or 
obloquy  upon  himself  in  order  to  accomplish  this. 

He  met  a  policeman  on  the  bridge  of  the  Public 
Garden,  and  made  bold  to  ask  him  at  once  if  he 
knew  an  officer  named  Baker,  and  which  station  he 
could  be  found  at.  The  policeman  was  over-rich  in 
the  acquaintance  of  two  officers  of  the  name  of  Baker, 
and  he  put  his  hand  on  Se well's  shoulder,  in  the 
paternal  manner  of  policemen  when  they  will  be 
friendly,  and  advised  him  to  go  first  to  the  Ncponset 
Street  station,  to  which  one  of  these  Bakers  was 
attached,  and  inquire  there  first.  "  Anyway,  that 's 
what  I  should  do  in  your  place." 


118  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

Sewell  was  fulsomely  grateful,  as  we  all  are  in  the 
like  case,  and  at  the  station  he  used  an  urbanity 
with  the  captain  which  was  perhaps  not  thrown 
away  upon  him,  but  which  was  certainly  dispropor- 
tioned  to  the  trouble  he  was  asking  him  to  take  in 
saying  whether  he  knew  where  he  could  find  officer 
Baker. 

"Yes,  I  do,"  said  the  captain.  "You  can  find 
him  in  bed,  upstairs,  but  I  'd  rather  you  wouldn't 
wake  a  man  off  duty,  if  you  don't  have  to,  especially 
if  you  don't  know  he  's  the  one.  What 's  wanted  1  " 

Sewell  stopped  to  say  that  the  captain  was  quite 
right,  and  then  he  explained  why  he  wished  to  see 
officer  Baker. 

The  captain  listened  with  nods  of  his  head  at  the 
names  and  facts  given.  "  Guess  you  won't  have  to 
get  Baker  up  for  that.  I  can  tell  you  what  there 
is  to  tell.  I  don't  know  where  your  young  man  is 
now,  but  I  gave  him  an  order  for  a  bed  at  the  Way 
farer's  Lodge  last  night,  and  I  guess  he  slept  there. 
You  a  friend  of  his  ? " 

"  Yes,"  said  Sewell,  much  questioning  inwardly 
whether  he  could  be  truly  described  as  such.  "I 
wish  to  befriend  him,"  he  added  savingly.  "  I  knew 
him  at  home,  and  I  am  sure  of  his  innocence." 

"  Oh,  I  guess  he 's  innocent  enough,"  said  the 
captain.  "Well,  now,  I  tell  you  what  you  do,  if 
you  want  to  befriend  him;  you  get  him  home  quick 
as  you  can." 

"Yes,"  said  Sewell,  helpless  to  resent  the  officer's 
authoritative  and  patronising  tone.  "  That 's  what 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     119 

I  wish  to  do.  Do  you  suppose  he 's  at  the  Wayfarer's 
Lodge  now  ? "  asked  Sewell. 

"  Can't  say,"  said  the  captain,  tilting  himself  back 
in  his  chair,  and  putting  his  quill  toothpick  between 
his  lips  like  a  cigarette.  "  The  only  way  is  to  go 
and  see." 

"  Thank  you  very  much,"  said  the  minister,  accept 
ing  his  dismissal  meekly,  as  a  man  vowed  to 
ignominy  should,  but  feeling  keenly  that  he  was 
dismissed,  and  dismissed  in  disgrace. 

At  the  Lodge  he  was  received  less  curtly.  The 
manager  was  there  with  a  long  morning's  leisure  be 
fore  him,  and  disposed  to  friendliness  that  Sewell 
found  absurdly  soothing.  He  turned  over  the  orders 
for  beds  delivered  by  the  vagrants  the  night  before, 
and  "  Yes,"  he  said,  coming  to  Lemuel's  name,  "  he 
slept  here  ;  but  nobody  knows  where  he  is  by  this 
time.  Wait  a  bit,  sir  ! "  he  added  to  Sewell's  fallen 
countenance.  "  There  was  one  of  the  young  fellows 
stayed  to  help  us  through  with  the  dishes,  this 
morning.  I  '11  have  him  up  ;  or  may  be  you  'd  like 
to  go  down  and  take  a  look  at  our  kitchen  1  You  '11 
find  him  there  if  it's  the  one.  Here's  our  card, 
We  can  supply  you  with  all  sorts  of  firewood  at  less 
cost  than  the  dealers,  and  you  '11  be  helping  the  poor 
fellows  to  earn  an  honest  bed  and  breakfast.  This 
way,  sir  !  " 

Sewell  promised  to  buy  his  wood  there,  put  the 
card  respectfully  into  his  pocket,  and  followed  the 
manager  downstairs,  and  through  the  basement  to  the 
kitchen.  He  arrived  just  as  Lemuel  wras  about  to 


120  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE. 

lift  a  trayful  of  clean  soup-bowls,  to  carry  it  upstairs. 
After  a  glance  at  the  minister,  he  stood  still  with 
dropped  eyes. 

Sewell  did  not  know  in  what  form  to  greet  the 
boy  on  whom  he  had  unwillingly  brought  so  much 
evil,  and  he  found  the  greater  difficulty  in  deciding 
as  he  saw  Lemuel's  face  hardening  against  him. 

"  Barker  !  "  he  said  at  last.  "  I  'm  very  glad  to 
find  you — I  have  been  very  anxious  to  find  you." 

Lemuel  made  no  sign  of  sympathy,  but  stood  still 
in  his  long  check  apron,  with  his  sleeves  rolled  up 
to  his  elbow,  and  the  minister  was  obliged  to  humble 
himself  still  further  to  this  figure  of  lowly  obstinacy. 

"  I  should  like  to  speak  with  you.  Can  I  speak 
with  you  a  few  moments  1  " 

The  manager  politely  stepped  into  the  storeroom, 
and  affected  to  employ  himself  there,  leaving  Lemuel 
and  the  minister  alone  together. 


X. 


SEWELL  lost  no  time.  "  I  want  you  to  go  home, 
Barker.  I  feel  that  I  am  wholly  to  blame,  and 
greatly  to  blame,  for  your  coming  to  Boston  with 
the  expectation  that  brought  you ;  and  that  I  am 
indirectly  responsible  for  all  the  trouble  that  has  be 
fallen  you  since  you  came.  I  want  to  be  the  means 
of  your  getting  home,  in  any  way  you  can  let  me." 

This  was  a  very  different  way  of  talking  from  the 
smooth  superiority  of  address  which  the  minister 
had  used  with  him  the  other  day  at  his  own  house. 
Lemuel  was  not  insensible  to  the  atonement  offered 
him,  and  it  was  not  from  sulky  stubbornness  that  he 
continued  silent,  and  left  the  minister  to  explore  the 
causes  of  his  reticence  unaided. 

"  I  will  go  home  with  you,  if  you  like,"  pursued 
the  minister,  though  his  mind  misgave  him  that  this 
was  an  extreme  which  Mrs.  Sewell  would  not  have 
justified  him  in.  "I  will  go  with  you,  and  explain 
all  the  circumstances  to  your  friends,  in  case  there 
should  be  any  misunderstanding — though  in  that 
event  I  should  have  to  ask  you  to  be  my  guest  till 

Monday."     Here  the  unhappy  man  laid  hold  of  the 

121 


122  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

sheep,  which  could  not  bring  him  greater  condem 
nation  than  the  lamb. 

"I  guess  they  won't  know  anything  about  it," 
said  Lemuel,  with  whatever  intention. 

It  seemed  hardened  indifference  to  the  minister, 
and  he  felt  it  his  disagreeable  duty  to  say,  "  I  am 
afraid  they  will.  I  read  of  it  in  the  newspaper  this 
morning,  and  I  'm  afraid  that  an  exaggerated  report 
of  your  misfortunes  will  reach  Willoughby  Pastures, 
and  alarm  your  family." 

A  faint  pallor  came  over  the  boy's  face,  and  he 
stood  again  in  his  impenetrable,  rustic  silence.  The 
voice  that  finally  spoke  from  it  said,  "  I  guess  I  don't 
want  to  go  home,  then." 

"  You  must  go  home  ! "  said  the  minister,  with 
more  of  imploring  than  imperiousness  in  his  com 
mand.  "  What  will  they  make  of  your  prolonged 
absence  1 " 

"  I  sent  a  postal  to  mother  this  morning.  They 
lent  me  one." 

"But  what  will  you  do  here,  without  work  and 
without  means  1  I  wish  you  to  go  home  with  me — 
I  feel  responsible  for  you — and  remain  with  me  till 
you  can  hear  from  your  mother.  I'm  sorry  you 
came  to  Boston — it 's  no  place  for  you,  as  you  must 
know  by  this  time,  and  I  am  sure  your  mother  will 
agree  with  me  in  desiring  your  return." 

"  I  guess  I  don't  want  to  go  home,"  said  Lemuel. 

"  Are  you  afraid  that  an  uncharitable  construction 
will  be  placed  upon  wrhat  has  happened  to  you  by 
your  neighbours  1 "  Lemuel  did  not  answer.  "  I 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  123 

assure  you  that  all  that  can  be  arranged.  I  will 
write  to  your  pastor,  and  explain  it  fully.  But  in 
any  event,"  continued  Sewell,  "it  is  your  duty  to 
yourself  and  your  friends  to  go  home  and  live  it 
down.  It  would  be  your  duty  to  do  so,  even  if  you 
had  been  guilty  of  wrong,  instead  of  the  victim  of 
misfortune." 

"  I  don't  know,"  said  Lemuel,  "  as  I  want  to  go 
home  and  be  the  laughing-stock." 

Against  this  point  Sewell  felt  himself  helpless. 
He  could  not  pretend  that  the  boy  would  not  be 
ridiculous  in  the  eyes  of  his  friends,  and  all  the  more 
ridiculous  because  so  wholly  innocent.  He  could 
only  say,  "That  is  a  thing  you  must  bear,"  and 
then  it  occurred  to  him  to  ask,  "Do  you  feel 
that  it  is  right  to  let  your  family  meet  the  ridicule 
alone  1 " 

"I  guess  nobody  will  speak  to  mother  about  it, 
more  than  once,"  said  Lemuel,  with  a  just  pride  in 
his  mother's  powers  of  retort.  A  woman  who, 
unaided  and  alone,  had  worn  the  Bloomer  costume 
for  twenty  years  in  the  heart  of  a  commentative 
community  like  Willoughby  Pastures,  was  not  likely 
to  be  without  a  cutting  tongue  for  her  defence. 

"But  your  sister,"  urged  Sewell ;  "your  brother- 
in-law,"  he  feebly  added. 

"  I  guess  they  will  have  to  stand  it,"  replied 
Lemuel. 

The  minister  heaved  a  sigh  of  hopeless  perplexity. 
"What  do  you  propose  to  do,  then1?  You  can't 
remain  here  without  means.  Do  you  expect  to  sell 


124  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

your  poetry  1 "  he  asked,  goaded  to  the  question  by 
a  conscience  peculiarly  sore  on  that  point. 

It  made  Lemuel  blush.  "No,  I  don't  expect  to 
sell  it,  now.  They  took  it  out  of  my  pocket  on  the 
Common." 

"I  am  glad  of  that,"  said  the  minister  as 
simply,  "and  I  feel  bound  to  warn  you  solemnly, 
that  there  is  absolutely  no  hope  for  you  in  that 
direction." 

Lemuel  said  nothing. 

The  minister  stood  baffled  again.  After  a  bad 
moment  he  asked,  "  Have  you  anything  particular 
in  view  ? " 

"  I  don't  know  as  I  have." 

"  How  long  can  you  remain  here  ? " 

"  I  don't  know  exactly." 

Sewell  turned  and  followed  the  manager  into  the 
refrigerator  room,  where  he  had  remained  patiently 
whistling  throughout  this  interview. 

When  he  came  back,  Lemuel  had  carried  one 
trayful  of  bowls  upstairs,  and  returned  for  another 
load,  which  he  was  piling  carefully  up  for  safe 
transportation. 

"The  manager  tells  me,"  said  Sewell,  "that 
practically  you  can  stay  here  as  long  as  you  like,  if 
you  work,  but  he  doesn't  think  it  desirable  you 
should  remain,  nor  do  I.  But  I  wish  to  find  you 
here  again,  when  I  come  back.  I  have  something  in 
view  for  you." 

This  seemed  to  be  a  question,  and  Lemuel  said, 
"All  right,"  and  went  on  piling  up  his  bowls.  He 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  125 

added,  "  I  shouldn't  want  you  to  take  a  great  deal 
of  trouble. " 

"  Oh,  it 's  no  trouble,"  groaned  the  minister. 
"Then  I  may  depend  upon  seeing  you  here  any 
time  during  the  day  1 " 

"  I  don't  know  as  I  'm  going  away,"  Lemuel  ad 
mitted. 

"Well,  then,  good-bye,  for  the  present,"  said 
Sewell,  and  after  speaking  again  to  the  manager, 
and  gratefully  ordering  some  kindling  which  he  did 
not  presently  need,  he  went  out,  and  took  his  way 
homeward.  But  he  stopped  half  a  block  short  of  his 
own  door,  and  rang  at  Miss  Vane's.  To  his  per 
turbed  and  eager  spirit,  it  seemed  nothing  short  of  a 
divine  mercy  that  she  should  be  at  home.  If  he  had 
not  been  a  man  bent  on  repairing  his  wrong  at  any 
cost  to  others,  he  would  hardly  have  taken  the  step 
he  now  contemplated  without  first  advising  with  his 
wife,  who,  he  felt  sure,  would  have  advised  against 
it.  His  face  did  not  brighten  at  all  when  Miss  Vane 
came  briskly  in,  with  the  "  How  d'  ye  do  ?  "  which  he 
commonly  found  so  cheering.  She  pulled  up  the 
blind  and  saw  his  knotted  brow. 

"  What  is  the  matter  1  You  look  as  if  you  had  got 
Lemuel  Barker  back  on  your  hands." 

"  I  have,"  said  the  minister  briefly. 

"  Miss  Vane  gave  a  wild  laugh  of  delight.  "  You 
dorit  mean  it !  "  she  sputtered,  sitting  down  before 
him,  and  peering  into  his  face.  "  What  do  you 
mean  ? " 

Sewell  was  obliged  to  possess  Miss  Vane's  entire 


126  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

ignorance  of  all  the  facts  in  detail.  From  point  to 
point  he  paused;  he  began  really  to  be  afraid  she 
would  do  herself  an  injury  with  her  laughing. 

She  put  her  hand  on  his  arm  and  bowed  her  head 
forward,  with  her  face  buried  in  her  handkerchief. 
"  What — what — do  you  suppose-pose — they  did  with 
the  po-po-poem  they  stole  from  him  1 " 

11  Well,  one  thing  I  'm  sure  they  didn't  do,"  said 
Sewell  bitterly,  "  They  didn't  read  it." 

Miss  Vane  hid  her  face  in  her  handkerchief,  and 
then  plucked  it  away,  and  shrieked  again.  She 
stopped,  with  the  sudden  calm  that  succeeds  such  a 
paroxysm,  and,  "Does  Mrs.  Sewell  know  all  about 
this  ? "  she  panted. 

"  She  knows  everything,  except  my  finding  him 
in  the  dish-washing  department  of  the  Wayfarer's 
Lodge,"  said  Sewell  gloomily,  "  and  my  coming  to 
you." 

"  Why  do  you  come  to  me  1 "  asked  Miss  Vane, 
her  face  twitching  and  her  eyes  brimming. 

"  Because,"  answered  Sewell,  "  I  'd  rather  not  go 
to  her  till  I  have  done  something." 

Miss  Vane  gave  way  again,  and  Sewell  sat  regard 
ing  her  ruefully. 

"  What  do  you  expect  me  to  do  ?  "  She  looked 
at  him  over  her  handkerchief,  which  she  kept  pressed 
against  her  mouth. 

"I  haven't  the  least  idea  what  I  expected  you  to 
do.  I  expected  you  to  tell  me.  You  have  an  in 
ventive  mind." 

Miss   Vane   shook    her   head.      Her   eyes    grew 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     127 

serious,  and  after  a  moment  she  said,  "  I  'm  afraid 
I'm  not  equal  to  Lemuel  Barker.  Besides,"  she 
added,  with  a  tinge  of  trouble,  "  I  have  my  problem, 
already." 

"  Yes,"  said  the  minister  sympathetically.  "  How 
has  the  flower  charity  turned  out  1  " 

11  She  went  yesterday  with  one  of  the  ladies,  and 
carried  flowers  to  the  city  hospital.  But  she  wasn't 
at  all  satisfied  with  the  result.  She  said  the  patients 
were  mostly  disgusting  old  men  that  hadn't  been 
shaved.  I  think  that  now  she  wants  to  try  her 
flowers  on  criminals.  She  says  she  wishes  to  visit 
the  prisons." 

Sewell  brightened  forlornly.  "  Why  not  let  her 
reform  Barker  ? " 

This  sent  Miss  Vane  off  again.  "  Poor  boy  !  " 
she  sighed,  when  she  had  come  to  herself.  "No, 
there 's  nothing  that  I  can  do  for  him,  except  to 
order  some  firewood  from  his  benefactors." 

"  I  did  that,"  said  Sewell.  "  But  I  don't  see  how 
it's  to  help  Barker  exactly." 

"  I  would  gladly  join  in  a  public  subscription  to 
send  him  home.  But  you  say  he  won't  go  home  1  " 

"  He  won't  go  home,"  sighed  the  minister.  "He  's 
determined  to  stay.  I  suspect  he  would  accept 
employment,  if  it  were  offered  him  in  the  right 
spirit." 

Miss  Vane  shook  her  head.  "  There 's  nothing  I 
can  think  of  except  shovelling  snow.  And  as  yet  it 's 
rather  warm  October  weather." 

"  There  's  certainly  no  snow  to  shovel,"  admitted 


128  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

Sewell.  He  rose  disconsolately.  "  Well,  there 's 
nothing  for  it,  I  suppose,  but  to  put  him  down  at 
the  Christian  Union,  and  explain  his  checkered 
career  to  everybody  who  proposes  to  employ  him." 

Miss  Yane  could  not  keep  the  laughter  out  of  her 
eyes ;  she  nervously  tapped  her  lips  with  her  hand 
kerchief^  to  keep  it  from  them.  Suddenly  she  halted 
Sewell,  in  his  dejected  progress  toward  the  door.  "  I 
might  give  him  my  furnace  ] " 

"  Furnace  ? "  echoed  Sewell. 

"  Yes.  Jackson  has  '  struck '  for  twelve  dollars  a 
month,  and  at  present  there  is  a  'lock-out,' — I 
believe  that's  what  it's  called.  And  I  had  deter 
mined  not  to  yield  as  long  as  the  fine  weather  lasted. 
I  knew  I  should  give  in  at  the  first  frost.  I  will 
take  Barker  now,  if  you  think  he  can  manage  the 
furnace." 

"I've  no  doubt  he  can.  Has  Jackson  really 
struck  ? "  Miss  Yane  nodded.  "  He  hasn't  said 
anything  to  me  about  it." 

"He  probably  intends  to  make  special  terms  to 
the  clergy.  But  he  told  me  he  was  putting  up  the 
rates  on  all  his  'famblies'  this  winter." 

"  If  he  puts  them  up  on  me,  I  will  take  Barker 
too,"  said  the  minister  boldly.  "  If  he  will  come," 
he  added,  with  less  courage.  "  Well,  I  will  go  round 
to  the  Lodge,  and  see  what  he  thinks  of  it.  Of 
course,  he  can't  live  upon  ten  dollars  a  month,  and  I 
must  look  him  up  something  besides." 

"  That 's  the  only  thing  I  can  think  of  at  present," 
said  Miss  Vane. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     129 

"Oh,  you're  indefinitely  good  to  think  of  so 
much,"  said  Sewell.  "  You  must  excuse  me  if  my 
reception  of  your  kindness  has  been  qualified  by 
the  reticence  with  which  Barker  received  mine,  this 
morning." 

"  Oh,  do  tell  me  about  it ! "  cried  Miss  Vane. 

"  Sometime  I  will.  But  I  can  assure  you  it  was 
such  as  to  make  me  shrink  from  another  interview. 
I  don't  know  but  Barker  may  fling  your  proffered 
furnace  in  my  teeth.  But  I  'm  sure  we  both  mean 
well.  .And  I  thank  you,  all  the  same.  Good-bye." 

"  Poor  Mr.  Sewell ! "  said  Miss  Vane,  following 
him  to  the  door.  "May  I  run  down  and  tell 
Mrs.  Sewell  ?" 

"  Not  yet,"  said  the  minister  sadly.  He  was  too 
insecure  of  Barker's  reception  to  be  able  to  enjoy 
the  joke. 

When  he  got  back  to  the  Wayfarer's  Lodge, 
whither  he  made  himself  walk  in  penance,  he  found 
Lemuel  with  a  book  in  his  hand,  reading,  while  the 
cook  stirred  about  the  kitchen,  and  the  broth,  which 
he  had  well  under  way  for  the  mid-day  meal,  lifted 
the  lid  of  its  boiler  from  time  to  time  and  sent  out 
a  joyous  whiff  of  steam.  The  place  had  really  a 
cosiness  of  its  own,  and  Sewell  began  to  fear  that 
his  victim  had  been  so  far  corrupted  by  its  comfort 
as  to  be  unwilling  to  leave  the  Eefuge.  He  had 
often  seen  the  subtly  disastrous  effect  of  bounty, 
and  it  was  one  of  the  things  he  trembled  for  in 
considering  the  question  of  public  aid  to  the  poor. 
Before  he  addressed  Barker,  he  saw  him  entered 
I 


130  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

upon  the  dire  life  of  idleness  and  dependence,  partial 
or  entire,  which  he  had  known  so  many  Americans 
even  willing  to  lead  since  the  first  great  hard  times 
began ;  and  he  spoke  to  him  with  the  asperity  of 
anticipative  censure. 

"Barker!"  he  said,  and  Lemuel  lifted  his  head 
from  the  book  he  was  reading.  "  I  have  found 
something  for  you  to  do.  I  still  prefer  you  should 
go  home,  and  I  advise  you  to  do  so.  But,"  he 
added,  at  the  look  that  came  into  Lemuel's  face, 
"  if  you  are  determined  to  stay,  this  is  the  best  I  can 
do  for  you.  It  isn't  a  full  support,  but  it 's  something, 
and  you  must  look  about  for  yourself,  and  not  rest 
till  you've  found  full  work,  and  something  better 
fitted  for  you.  Do  you  think  you  can  take  care  of 
a  furnace  1 " 

"  Hot  air  ?  "  asked  Lemuel. 

"Yes." 

"  I  guess  so.  I  took  care  of  the  church  furnace, 
last  winter." 

"  I  didn't  know  you  had  one,"  said  the  minister, 
brightening  in  the  ray  of  hope.  "Would  you  be 
willing  to  take  care  of  a  domestic  furnace — a  furnace 
in  a  private  house  1 " 

Lemuel  pondered  the  proposal  in  silence.  What 
ever  objections  there  were  to  it  in  its  difference 
from  the  aims  of  his  ambition  in  coming  to  the  city 
of  Boston,  he  kept  to  himself ;  and  his  ignorance  of 
city  prejudices  and  sophistications  probably  suggested 
nothing  against  the  honest  work  to  his  pride.  "  I 
guess  I  should,"  he  said  at  last. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     131 

"Well,  then,  come  with  me." 

Sewell  judged  it  best  not  to  tell  hinrwhose  furnace 
he  was  to  take  care  of ;  he  had  an  impression  that 
Miss  Vane  was  included  in  the  resentment  which 
Lemuel  seemed  to  cherish  toward  him.  But  when 
he  had  him  at  her  door,  "  It 's  the  lady  whom  you 
saw  at  my  house  the  other  day,"  he  explained.  It 
was  then  too  late  for  Lemuel  to  rebel  if  he  had 
wished,  and  they  went  in. 

If  there  was  any  such  unkindness  in  Lemuel's 
breast  toward  her,  it  yielded  promptly  to  her  tact. 
She  treated  him  at  once,  not  like  a  servant,  but  like 
a  young  person,  and  yet  she  used  a  sort  of  respect 
for  his  independence  which  was  soothing  to  his 
rustic  pride.  She  put  it  on  the  money  basis  at  once  ; 
she  told  him  that  she  should  give  him  ten  dollars  a 
month  for  taking  care  of  the  furnace,  keeping  the 
sidewalk  clear  of  snow,  shovelling  the  paths  in  the 
backyard  for  the  women  to  get  at  their  clothes-lines, 
carrying  up  and  down  coal  and  ashes  for  the  grates, 
and  doing  errands.  She  said  that  this  was  what 
she  had  always  paid,  and  asked  him  if  he  understood 
and  were  satisfied. 

Lemuel  answered  with  one  yes  to  both  her 
questions,  and  then  Miss  Vane  said  that  of  course 
till  the  weather  changed  they  should  want  no  fire 
in  the  furnace,  but  that  it  might  change,  any  day, 
and  they  should  begin  at  once  and  count  October 
as  a  full  month.  She  thought  he  had  better  go 
down  and  look  at  the  furnace  and  see  if  it  was  in 
order;  she  had  had  the  pipes  cleaned,  but  perhaps 


1 32  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

it  needed  blacking ;  the  cook  would  show  him  how 
it  worked.  She  went  with  him  to  the  head  of  the 
basement  stairs,  and  calling  down,  "Jane,  here  is 
Lemuel,  come  to  look  after  the  furnace,"  left  him 
and  Jane  to  complete  the  acquaintance  upon  coming 
in  sight  of  each  other,  and  went  back  to  the  minister. 
He  had  risen  to  go,  and  she  gave  him  her  hand, 
while  a  smile  rippled  into  laughter  on  her  lips. 

"Do  you  think/'  she  asked,  struggling  with  her 
mirth  to  keep  unheard  of  those  below,  "  that  it  is 
quite  the  work  for  a  literary  man  1  " 

"If  he  is  a  man,"  said  Sewell  courageously,  "the 
work  won't  keep  him  from  being  literary." 

Miss  Vane  laughed  at  his  sudden  recovery  of 
spirit,  as  she  had  laughed  at  his  dejection ;  but  he 
did  not  care.  He  hurried  home,  with  a  sermon 
kindling  in  his  mind  so  obviously,  that  his  wife  did 
not  detain  him  beyond  a  few  vital  questions,  and 
let  him  escape  from  having  foisted  his  burden  upon 
Miss  Yane  with  the  simple  comment,  "  Well,  we 
shall  see  how  that  will  work." 

As  once  before,  Sewell  tacitly  took  a  hint  from  his 
own  experience,  and  enlarging  to  more  serious  facts 
from  it,  preached  effort  in  the  erring.  He  denounced 
mere  remorse.  Better  not  feel  that  at  all,  he  taught ; 
and  he  declared  that  what  is  ordinarily  distinguished 
from  remorse  as  repentance,  was  equally  a  mere  cor 
rosion  of  the  spirit  unless  some  attempt  at  reparation 
went  with  it.  He  maintained  that  though  some 
mischiefs — perhaps  most  mischiefs — were  irreparable 
so  far  as  restoring  the  original  status  was  concerned, 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  133 

yet  every  mischief  was  reparable  in  the  good-will 
and  the  good  deed  of  its  prepetrator.  Do  what  you 
could  to  retrieve  yourself  from  error,  and  then,  not 
leave  the  rest  to  Providence,  but  keep  doing.  The 
good,  however  small,  must  grow  if  tended  and 
nurtured  like  a  useful  plant,  as  the  evil  would  cer 
tainly  grow,  like  a  wild  and  poisonous  weed,  if  left 
to  itself.  Sin,  he  said,  was  a  terrible  mystery ;  one 
scarcely  knew  how  to  deal  with  it  or  to  attempt  to 
determine  its  nature ;  but  perhaps — he  threw  out 
the  thought  while  warning  those  who  heard  him  of 
its  danger  in  some  aspects — sin  was  not  wholly  an 
evil.  We  were  so  apt  in  this  world  of  struggle  and 
ambition  to  become  centred  solely  in  ourselves, 
that  possibly  the  wrong  done  to  another, — the 
wrong  that  turned  our  thoughts  from  ourselves,  and 
kept  them  bent  in  agony  and  despair  upon  the 
suffering  we  had  caused  another,  and  knew  not  how 
to  mitigate — possibly  this  wrong,  nay,  certainly  this 
wrong,  was  good  in  disguise.  But,  returning  to  his 
original  point,  we  were  to  beware  how  we  rested  in 
this  despair.  In  the  very  extremity  of  our  anguish, 
our  fear,  our  shame,  we  were  to  gird  ourselves  up 
to  reparation.  Strive  to  do  good,  he  preached; 
strive  most  of  all  to  do  good  to  those  you  have 
done  harm  to.  His  text  was  "  Cease  to  do 
evil." 

He  finished  his  sermon  during  the  afternoon,  and 
in  the  evening  his  wife  said  they  would  run  up  to 
Miss  Vane's.  Sewell  shrank  from  this  a  little,  with 
the  obscure  dread  that  Lemuel  might  have  turned 


134  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

his  back  upon  good  fortune,  and  abandoned  the 
place  offered  him,  in  which  case  Sewell  would  have 
to  give  a  wholly  different  turn  to  his  sermon ;  but 
he  consented,  as  indeed  he  must.  He  was  as 
curious  as  his  wife  to  know  how  the  experiment 
had  resulted. 

Miss  Yane  did  not  wait  to  let  them  ask.  "  My 
dear,"  she  said,  kissing  Mrs.  Sewell  and  giving  her 
hand  to  the  minister  in  one,  "  he  is  a  pearl !  And 
I  Ve  kept  him  from  mixing  his  native  lustre  with 
Kising  Sun  Stove  Polish  by  becoming  his  creditor  in 
the  price  of  a  pair  of  overalls.  I  had  no  idea  they 
were  so  cheap,  and  you  can  see  that  they  will  fade, 
with  a  few  washings,  to  a  perfect  Millet  blue.  They 
were  quite  his  own  idea,  when  he  found  the  furnace 
needed  blacking,  and  he  wanted  to  use  the  fifty 
cents  he  earned  this  morning  toward  the  purchase, 
but  I  insisted  upon  advancing  the  entire  dollar  my 
self.  Neatness,  self-respect,  awe-inspiring  deference  ! 
—he  is  each  and  every  one  of  them  in  person." 

Sewell  could  not  forbear  a  glance  of  triumph  at 
his  wife. 

"  You  leave  us  very  little  to  ask,"  said  that  in 
jured  woman. 

"  But  I  Ve  left  myself  a  great  deal  to  tell,  my 
dear,"  retorted  Miss  Yane,  "  and  I  propose  to  keep 
the  floor ;  though  I  don't  really  know  where  to  be 
gin." 

"I  thought  you  had  got  past  the  necessity  of 
beginning,"  said  Sewell.  "We  know  that  the  new 
pearl  sweeps  clean,"— Miss  Yane  applauded  his 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  135 

mixed  metaphor — "  and  now  you  might  go  on  from 
that  point." 

"  Well,  you  may  think  I  'm  rash,"  said  Miss  Vane, 
"  but  I  've  thoroughly  made  up  my  mind  to  keep 
him." 

"  Dear,  dear  Miss  Vane ! "  cried  the  minister. 
"  Mrs.  Sewell  thinks  you  're  rash,  but  I  don't. 
What  do  you  mean  by  keeping  him  1 " 

"Keeping  him  as  a  fixture — a  permanency — a 
continuosity." 

"  Oh  !  A  continuosity  1  I  know  what  that  is  in 
the  ordinary  acceptation  of  the  term,  but  I  'm  not 
sure  that  I  follow  your  meaning  exactly." 

"Why,  it's  simply  this,"  said  Miss  Vane.  "I 
have  long  secretly  wanted  the  protection  of  what 
Jane  calls  a  man-body  in  the  house,  and  when  I  saw 
how  Lemuel  had  blacked  the  furnace,  I  knew  I 
should  feel  as  safe  with  him  as  with  a  whole  body 
of  troops." 

"Well,"  sighed  the  minister,  "you  have  not  been 
rash,  perhaps,  but  you'll  allow  that  you've  been 
rapid." 

"No,"  said  Miss  Vane,  "I  won't  allow  that. 
I  have  simply  been  intuitive — nothing  more.  His 
functions  are  not  decided  yet,  but  it  is  decided  that 
he  is  to  stay ;  he  's  to  sleep  in  the  little  room  over 
the  L,  and  in  my  tranqnillised  consciousness  he  's 
been  there  years  already." 

"And  has  Sibyl  undertaken  Barker's  reforma 
tion  1 "  asked  Sewell. 

"  Don't   interrupt !     Don't   anticipate  !     I   admit 


136  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

nothing  till  I  come  to  it.  But  after  I  had  arranged 
with  Lemuel  I  began  to  think  of  Sibyl." 

"  That  was  like  some  ladies  I  have  known  of," 
said  Sewell.  "  You  women  commit  yourselves  to  a 
scheme,  in  order  to  show  your  skill  in  reconciling 
circumstances  to  the  irretrievable.  Well  1  " 

"Don't  interrupt,  David  !  "  cried  his  wife. 

"Oh,  let  him  go  on,"  said  Miss  Vane.  "It's  all 
very  well,  taking  people  into  your  house  on  the  spur 
of  the  moment,  and  in  obedience  to  a  generous  im 
pulse,  but  when  you  reflect  that  the  object  of  your 
good  intentions  slept  in  the  Wayfarer's  Lodge  the 
night  before,  and  in  the  police-station  the  night 
before  that,  and  enjoys  a  newspaper  celebrity  in 
connection  with  a  case  of  assault  and  battery  with 
intent  to  rob, — why,  then  you  do  reflect !  " 

"Yes,"  said  Sewell,  "  that  is  just  the  point  where 
I  should  begin." 

"  I  thought,"  continued  Miss  Vane,  "  I  had  better 
tell  Sibyl  all  about  it,  so  if  by  any  chance  the 
neighbours'  kitchens  should  have  heard  of  the  case — 
they  read  the  police  reports  very  carefully  in  the 
kitchens " 

"They  do  in  some  drawing-rooms,"  interrupted 
Sewell. 

"  It 's  well  for  you  they  do,  David,"  said  his  wife. 
"Your  prottgt  would  have  been  in  your  Eefuge 
still,  if  they  didn't." 

"I  see!"  cried  the  minister.  "I  shall  have  to 
take  the  Sunrise  another  week." 

Miss    Vane   looked   from   one   to    the   other    in 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  137 

sympathetic  ignorance,  but  they  did  not  explain, 
and  she  went  on. 

"  And  if  they  should  hear  Lemuel's  name,  and  put 
two  and  two  together,  and  the  talk  should  get  to 
Sibyl — well,  I  thought  it  all  over,  until  the  whole 
thing  became  perfectly  lurid,  and  I  wished  Lemuel 
Barker  was  back  in  the  depths  of  "VVilloughby 
Pastures— 

"  I  understand/7  said  Sewell.     "  Go  on  !" 

Miss  Vane  did  so,  after  stopping  to  laugh.  "  It 
seemed  to  me  I  couldn't  wait  for  Sibyl  to  get  home — 
she  spent  the  night  in  Brookline,  and  didn't  come 
till  five  o'clock — to  tell  her.  I  began  before  she  had 
got  her  hat  or  gloves  off,  and  she  sat  down  with 
them  on,  and  listened  like  a  three-years'  child  to  the 
Ancient  Mariner,  but  she  lost  no  time  when  she 
understood  the  facts.  She  went  out  immediately  and 
stripped  the  nasturtium  bed.  If  you  could  have  seen 
it  when  you  came  in,  there  's  hardly  a  blossom  left. 
She  took  the  decorations  of  Lemuel's  room  into  her 
own  hands  at  once  ;  and  if  there  is  any  saving  power 
in  nasturtiums,  he  will  be  a  changed  person.  She 
says  that  now  the  great  object  is  to  keep  him  from 
feeling  that  he  has  been  an  outcast,  and  needs  to  be 
reclaimed ;  she  says  nothing  could  b*e  worse  for  him. 
I  don't  know  how  she  knows." 

"Barker  might  feel  that  he  was  disgraced,"  said 
the  minister,  "but  I  don't  believe  that  a  whole 
system  of  ethics  would  make  him  suspect  that  he 
needed  to  be  reclaimed." 

"He  makes  me  suspect  that   /  need  to  be  re- 


138  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE. 

claimed,"   said  Miss  Vane,  "when  he  looks  at  me 
with  those  beautiful  honest  eyes  of  his." 

Mrs.  Sewell  asked,  "  Has  he  seen  the  decorations 
yet  ? " 

"  Not  at  all.  They  are  to  steal  upon  him  when 
he  comes  in  to-night.  The  gas  is  to  be  turned  very 
low,  and  he  is  to  notice  everything  gradually,  so  as 
not  to  get  the  impression  that  things  have  been 
done  with  a  design  upon  him."  She  laughed  in 
reporting  these  ideas,  which  were  plainly  those  of 
the  young  girl.  "  Sh  ! "  she  whispered  at  the  end. 

A  tall  girl,  with  a  slim  vase  in  her  hand,  drifted 
in  upon  their  group  like  an  apparition.  She  had 
heavy  black  eyebrows  with  beautiful  blue  eyes  under 
them,  full  of  an  intensity  unrelieved  by  humour. 

"Aunty!"  she  said  severely,  "have  you  been 
telling  ?  " 

"Only  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Sewell,  Sibyl,"  said  Miss 
Vane.  "  Their  knowing  won't  hurt.  He  '11  never 
know  it." 

"If  he  hears  you  laughing,  he'll  know  it's  about 
him.  He  's  in  the  kitchen,  now.  He  's  come  in  the 
back  way.  Do  be  quiet."  She  had  given  her  hand 
without  other  greeting  in  her  preoccupation  to  each 
of  the  Sewells  in  turn,  and  now  she  passed  out  of 
the  room. 


XL 


"WHAT  makes  Lemuel  such  a  gift,"  said  Miss  Vane, 
in  a  talk  which  she  had  with  Sewell  a  month  later, 
"is  that  he  is  so  supplementary." 

"  Do  you  mean  just  in  the  supplementary  sense  of 
the  term  ?" 

"  Well,  not  in  the  fifth-wheel  sense.  I  mean  that 
he  supplements  us,  all  and  singular — if  you  will 
excuse  the  legal  exactness." 

"  Oh,  certainly,"  said  Sewell ;  "  I  should  like  even 
more  exactness." 

"Yes;  but  before  I  particularise  I  must  express 
my  general  satisfaction  in  him  as  a  man- body.  I 
had  no  idea  that  man  bodies  in  a  house  were  so  per 
fectly  admirable." 

"I've  sometimes  feared  that  we  were  not  fully 
appreciated,"  said  Sewell.  "  Well  1  " 

"The  house  is  another  thing  with  a  man-body  in 
it.  I  Ve  often  gone  without  little  things  I  wanted, 
simply  because  I  hated  to  make  Sarah  bring  them, 
and  because  I  hated  still  worse  to  go  after  them, 
knowing  we  were  both  weakly  and  tired.  Now  I 
deny  myself  nothing.  I  make  Lemuel  fetch  and 

139 


140  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

carry  without  remorse,  from  morning  till  night.  I 
never  knew  it  before,  but  the  man-body  seems  never 
to  be  tired,  or  ill,  or  sleepy." 

"  Yes,"  said  Sewell,  "  that  is  often  the  idea  of  the 
woman-body.  I  'm  not  sure  that  it 's  correct." 

"  Oh,  don't  attack  it !"  implored  Miss  Vane.  "  You 
don't  blow  what  a  blessing  it  is.  Then,  the  man-body 
never  complains,  and  I  can't  see  that  he  expects  any 
thing  more  in  an  order  than  the  clear  understand 
ing  of  it.  He  doesn't  expect  it  to  be  accounted 
for  in  any  way;  the  fact' that  you  say  you  want  a 
thing  is  enough.  It  is  very  strange.  Then  the 
moral  support  of  the  presence  of  a  man-body  is  enor 
mous.  I  now  know  that  I  have  never  slept  soundly 
since  I  have  kept  house  alone — that  I  have  never 
passed  a  night  without  hearing  burglars  or  smell 
ing  fire." 

"  And  now  ?  " 

"And  now  I  shouldn't  mind  a  legion  of  burglars 
in  the  house ;  I  shouldn't  mind  being  burned  in  my 
bed  every  night.  I  feel  that  Lemuel  is  in  charge, 
and  that  nothing  can  happen." 

"  Is  he  really  so  satisfactory  1 "  asked  Sewell, 
exhaling  a  deep  relief. 

"He  is,  indeed,"  said  Miss  Yane.  "I  couldn't 
exaggerate  it." 

"  Well,  well !  Don't  try.  We  are  finite,  after  all, 
you  know.  Do  you  think  it  can  last  1 " 

"  I  have  thought  of  that,"  answered  Miss  Yane. 
"  I  don't  see  why  it  shouldn't  last.  I  have  tried  to 
believe  that  I  did  a  foolish  thing  in  coming  to  your 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     141 

rescue,  but  I  can't  see  that  I  did.  I  don't  see  why  it 
shouldn't  last  as  long  as  Lemuel  chooses.  And  he 
seems  perfectly  contented  with  his  lot.  He  doesn't 
seem  to  regard  it  as  domestic  service,  but  as  domes 
tication,  and  he  patronises  our  inefficiency  while  he 
spares  it.  His  common-sense  is  extraordinary — it 's 
exemplary ;  it  almost  makes  one  wish  to  have  com 
mon-sense  one's-self."  They  had  now  got  pretty  far 
from  the  original  proposition,  and  Sewell  returned 
to  it  with  the  question,  "Well,  and  how  does  he 
supplement  you  singularly  ?  " 

"  Oh  !  oh,  yes  I  "  said  Miss  Yane.  "  I  could  hardly 
tell  you  without  going  into  too  deep  a  study  of 
character." 

"  I  'm  rather  fond  of  that,"  suggested  the  minister. 

"  Yes,  and  I  've  no  doubt  we  should  all  work  very 
nicely  into  a  sermon  as  illustrations ;  but  I  can't 
more  than  indicate  the  different  cases.  In  the  first 
place,  Jane's  forgetfulness  seems  to  be  growing  upon 
her,  and  since  Lemuel  came  she  's  abandoned  herself 
to  ecstasies  of  oblivion." 

"Yes?" 

"  Yes.  She 's  quite  given  over  remembering  any 
thing,  because  she  knows  that  he  will  remember 
everything." 

"I  see.     And  you?" 

"Well,  you  have  sometimes  thought  I  was  a  little 
rash." 

"  A  little  t     Did  I  think  it  was  a  little  !" 

"Well,  a  good  deal  But  it  was  all  nothing  to 
what  I  've  been  since  Lemuel  came.  I  used  to  keep 


142  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

some  slight  check  upon  myself  for  Sibyl's  sake ;  but 
I  don't  now.  I  know  that  Lemuel  is  there  to  temper, 
to  delay,  to  modify  the  effect  of  every  impulse,  and 
so  I  am  all  impulse  now.  And  I  Ve  quite  ceased  to 
rule  my  temper.  I  know  that  Lemuel  has  self-control 
enough  for  all  the  tempers  in  the  house,  and  so  I  feel 
perfectly  calm  in  my  wildest  transports  of  fury." 

"I  understand,"  said  Sewell.  "And  does  Sibyl 
permit  herself  a  similar  excess  in  her  fancies  and 
ambitions  1" 

"  Quite,"  said  Miss  Vane.  "  I  don't  know  that 
she  consciously  relies  upon  Lemuel  to  supplement 
her,  any  more  than  Jane  does ;  but  she  must  be 
unconsciously  aware  that  no  extravagance  of  hers 
can  be  dangerous  while  Lemuel  is  in  the  house." 

"  Unconsciously  aware  is  good.  She  hasn't  got 
tired  of  reforming  him  yet  1" 

"  I  don't  know.  I  sometimes  think  she  wishes  he 
had  ^gone  a  little  farther  in  crime.  Then  his  refor 
mation  would  be  more  obvious." 

"  Yes ;  I  can  appreciate  that.  Does  she  still  look 
after  his  art  and  literature  ?" 

"  That  phase  has  changed  a  little.  She  thinks 
now  that  he  ought  to  be  stimulated,  if  anything — 
that  he  ought  to  read  George  Eliot.  She 's  put 
Middlcmarcli  and  Romola  on  his  -shelf.  She  says 
that  he  looks  like  Tito  Malemma." 

Sewell  rose.  "  AVell,  I  don't  see  but  what  your 
supplement  is  a  very  demoralising  element.  I  shall 
never  dare  to  tell  Mrs.  Sewell  what  you've  said." 

"Oh,   she   knows  it,"  cried  Miss  Vane.     "We've 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     143 

agreed  that  you  will  counteract  any  temptation  that 
Lemuel  may  feel  to  abuse  his  advantages  by  the  fero 
ciously  self-denying  sermons  you  preach  at  him 
every  Sunday." 

"  Do  I  preach  at  him  ]  Do  you  notice  it  1"  asked 
Sewell  nervously. 

"Notice  it?"  laughed  Miss  Vane.  "I  should 
think  your  whole  congregation  would  notice  it.  You 
seem  to  look  at  nobody  else." 

"  I  know  it !  Since  he  began  to  come,  I  can't 
keep  my  eyes  off  him.  I  do  deliver  my  sermons  at 
him.  I  believe  I  write  them  at  him  !  He  has  an 
eye  of  terrible  and  exacting  truth.  I  feel  myself  on 
trial  before  him.  He  holds  me  up  to  a  standard  of 
sincerity  that  is  killing  me.  Mrs.  Sewell  was  bad 
enough ;  I  was  reasonably  bad  myself ;  but  this  ! 
Couldn't  you  keep  him  away  ?  Do  you  think  it  ;s 
exactly  decorous  to  let  your  man-servant  occupy  a 
seat  in  your  family  pew  ?  How  do  you  suppose  it 
looks  to  the  Supreme  Being  ?" 

Miss  Vane  was  convulsed.  "  I  had  precisely  those 
misgivings  !  But  Lemuel  hadn't.  He  asked  me  what 
the  number  of  our  pew  was,  and  I  hadn't  the  heart — 
or  else  I  hadn't  the  face — to  tell  him  he  mustn't 
sit  in  it.  How  could  I  ?  Do  you  think  it 's  so  very 
scandalous1?" 

"  I  don't  know,"  said  Sewell.  "  It  may  lead  to 
great  abuses.  If  we  tacitly  confess  ourselves  equal 
in  the  sight  of  God,  how  much  better  are  we  than 
the  Roman  Catholics  ? " 

Miss  Vane  could  not  suffer  these  ironies  to  go  on. 


144  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

"  He  approves  of  your  preaching.  He  has  talked 
your  sermons  over  with  me.  You  oughtn't  to 
complain." 

"  Oh,  I  don't !  Do  you  think  he  's  really  softening 
a  little  toward  me  1  " 

"  Not  personally,  that  I  know,"  said  Miss  Vane. 
"  But  he  seems  to  regard  you  as  a  channel  of  the 
truth." 

"I  ought  to  be  glad  of  so  much,"  said  Sewell. 
"  I  confess  that  I  hadn't  supposed  he  was  at  all 
of  our  way  of  thinking.  They  preached  a  very 
appreciable  orthodoxy  at  Willoughby  Pastures." 

"  I  don't  know  about  that,"  said  Miss  Varie.  "  I 
only  know  that  he  approves  your  theology,  or  your 
ethics." 

"  Ethics,  I  hope.  I  'm  sure  they  're  right."  After  a 
thoughtful  moment  the  minister  asked,  "Have  you 
observed  that  they  have  softened  him  socially  at 
all — broken  up  that  terrible  rigidity  of  attitude, 
that  dismaying  retentiveness  of  speech  ?" 

"  I  know  what  you  mean  ! '  cried  Miss  Vane  de 
lightedly.  "  I  believe  Lemuel  is  a  little  more  supple, 
a  little  less  like  a  granite  boulder  in  one  of  his 
meadows.  But  I  can't  say  that  he  's  glib  yet.  He 
isn't  apparently  going  to  say  more  than  he  thinks." 

"  I  hope  he  thinks  more  than  he  says,"  sighed  the 
minister.  "  My  interviews  with  Lemuel  have  left 
me  not  only  exhausted  but  bruised,  as  if  I  had  been 
hurling  myself  against  a  dead  wall.  Yes,  I  manage 
him  better  from  the  pulpit,  and  I  certainly  oughtn't 
to  complain.  I  don't  expect  him  to  make  any  re- 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.      145 

sponse,  and  I  perceive  that  I  am  not  quite  so  sore  as 
after  meeting  him  in  private  life." 

That  evening  Lemuel  was  helping  to  throng  the 
platform  of  an  overcrowded  horse-car.  It  was  Satur 
day  night,  and  he  was  going  to  the  provision  man 
up  toward  the  South  End,  whom  Miss  Vane  was 
dealing  with  for  the  time  being,  in  an  economical 
recoil  from  her  expensive  Back  Bay  provision  man, 
to  order  a  forgotten  essential  of  the  Sunday's  sup 
plies.  He  had  already  been  at  the  grocer's,  and  was 
carrying  home  three  or  four  packages  to  save  the 
cart  from  going  a  third  time  that  day  to  Bolingbroke 
Street,  and  he  stepped  down  into  the  road  when 
two  girls  came  squeezing  their  way  out  of  the  car. 

"  Well,  I  'm  glad,"  said  one  of  them  in  a  voice 
Lemuel  knew  at  once,  "  't  there  's  one  man 's  got  the 
politeness  to  make  a  little  grain  o'  room  for  you. 
Thank  you,  sir  !"  she  added,  with  more  scorn  for 
the  others  than  gratitude  for  Lemuel.  "  You  're  a 
gentleman,  anyway. " 

The  hardened  offenders  on  the  platform  laughed, 
but  Lemuel  said  simply,  "You're  quite  welcome." 

"Why,  land's  sakes  !  "  shouted  the  girl.  "  Well, 
if  'tain't  you  !  S'tira  !  "  she  exclaimed  to  her  com 
panion  in  utter  admiration.  Then  she  added  to 
Lemuel,  "Why,  I  didn't  s'pose  but  what  you'd  a' 
be'n  back  home  long  ago.  Well,  I  am  glad.  Be'n 
in  Boston  ever  since  ?  Well,  I  want  to  know  ! " 

The  conductor  had  halted  his  car  for  the  girls  to 
get  off,  but,  as  he  remarked  with  a  vicious  jerk  at 
K 


146  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

his  bell-strap,  he  could  not  keep  his  car  standing 
there  while  a  woman  was  asking  about  the  folks,  and 
the  horses  started  up  and  left  Lemuel  behind. 
"  Well,  there  !  "  said  'Manda  Grier.  «  T  I  hain't 
made  you  lose  your  car !  I  never  see  folks  like 
some  them  conductors." 

"  Oh,  I  guess  I  can  walk  the  rest  of  the  way," 
said  Lemuel,  his  face  bright  with  a  pleasure  visible 
in  the  light  of  the  lamp  that  brought  out  Statira 
Dudley's  smiles  and  the  forward  thrust  of  'Manda 
Grier's  whopper-jaw  as  they  turned  toward  the 
pavement  together. 

"  Well,  I  guess  'f  I  Ve  spoke  about  you  once,  I 
have  a  hundred  times,  in  the  last  six  weeks.  I 
always  told  S'tira  you  'd  be'n  sure  to  turn  up  b'fore 
this  'f  you  'd  be'n  in  Boston  all  the  time ;  'n'  3t  I 
guessed  you  'd  got  a  disgust  for  the  place,  'n'  't  you 
wouldn't  want  to  see  it  again  for  one  while." 

Statira  did  not  say  anything.  She  walked  on  the 
other  side  of  'Manda  Grier,  who  thrust  her  in  the 
side  from  time  to  time  with  a  lift  of  her  elbow, 
in  demand  of  sympathy  and  corroboration ;  but 
though  she  only  spoke  to  answer  yes  or  no,  Lemuel 
could  see  that  she  was  always  smiling  or  else  biting 
her  lip  to  keep  herself  from  it.  He  thought  she 
looked  about  as  pretty  as  anybody  could,  and  that 
she  was  again  very  fashionably  dressed.  She  had 
on  a  short  dolman,  and  a  pretty  hat  that  shaded  her 
forehead  but  fitted  close  round,  and  she  wore  long 
gloves  that  came  up  on  her  sleeves.  She  had  a  book 
from  the  library ;  she  walked  with  a  little  bridling 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     147 

movement  that  he  found  very  ladylike.  'Manda 
Grier  tilted  along  between  them,  and  her  tongue  ran 
and  ran,  so  that  Lemuel,  when  they  came  to  Miss 
Vane's  provision  man's,  could  hardly  get  in  a  word 
to  say  that  he  guessed  he  must  stop  there. 

Statira  drifted  on  a  few  paces,  but  'Manda  Grier 
halted  abruptly  with  him.  "Well,  'f  you're  ever 
up  our  -way  we  sh'd  be  much  pleased  to  have  you 
call,  Mr.  Barker,"  she  said  formally. 

"  I  should  be  much  pleased  to  do  so,"  said  Lemuel 
with  equal  state. 

"  Tain't  but  just  a  little  ways  round  here  on  the 
Avenue,"  she  added. 

Lemuel  answered,  "I  guess  I  know  where  it  is." 
He  did  not  mean  it  for  anything  of  a  joke,  but 
both  the  girls  laughed,  and  though  she  had  been  so 
silent  before,  Statira  laughed  the  most. 

"He  could  not  help  laughing  either  when  'Manda 
Grier  said,  "I  guess  if  you  was  likely  to  forget  the 
number  you  could  go  round  to  the  station  and 
inquire.  They  got  your  address  too." 

"  'Manda  Grier,  you  be  still ! "  said  Statira. 

"  S'tira  said  that 's  the  way  she  knew  you  was 
from  Willoughby  Pastures.  Her  folks  is  from  up 
that  way,  themselves.  She  says  the  minute  she 
heard  the  name  she  knew  it  couldn't  V  be'n  you, 
whoever  it  was  done  it," 

"  'Manda  Grier  ! "  cried  Statira  again. 

"I  tell  her  she  don't  believe  't  any  harm  can 
come  out  the  town  o'  Willoughby,  anywheres." 

"  'Manda  !  "  cried  Statira 


148  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

Lemuel  was  pleased,  but  he  could  not  say  a  word. 
He  could  not  look  at  Statira. 

"  Well,  good  evening/7  said  Amanda  Grier. 

"Well,  good  evening,"  said  Lemuel. 

"  Well,  good  evening,"  said  Statira. 

"Well,  good  evening,"  said  Lemuel  again. 

The  next  moment  they  were  gone  round  the 
corner,  and  he  was  left  standing  before  the  pro 
vision  man's,  with  his  packages  in  his  hand.  It  did 
not  come  to  him  till  he  had  transacted  his  business 
within,  and  was  on  his  way  home,  that  he  had  been 
very  impolite  not  to  ask  if  he  might  not  see  them 
home.  He  did  not  know  but  he  ought  to  go  back 
and  try  to  find  them,  and  apologise  for  his  rudeness, 
and  yet  he  did  not  see  how  he  could  do  that, 
either ;  he  had  no  excuse  for  it ;  he  was  afraid  it 
would  seem  queer,  and  make  them  laugh.  Besides, 
he  had  those  things  for  Miss  Vane,  and  the  cook 
wanted  some  of  them  at  once. 

He  could  hardly  get  to  sleep  that  night  for 
thinking  of  his  blunder,  and  at  times  he  cowered 
under  the  bedclothes  for  shame.  He  decided  that 
the  only  way  for  him  to  do  was  to  keep  out  of  their 
way  after  this,  and  if  he  ever  met  them  anywhere, 
to  pretend  not  to  see  them. 

The  next  morning  he  went  to  hear  Mr.  Sewell 
preach,  as  usual,  but  he  found  himself  wandering  far 
from  the  sermon,  and  asking  or  answering  this  or 
that  in  a  talk  with  those  girls  that  kept  going  on  in 
his  mind.  The  minister  himself  seemed  to  wander, 
and  at  times,  when  Lemuel  forced  a  return  to  him, 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     149 

he  thought  he  was  boggling  strangely.  For  the 
first  time  Mr.  Sewell's  sermon,  in  his  opinion,  did 
not  come  to  much. 

While  his  place  in  Miss  Vane's  household  was 
indefinitely  ascertained,  he  had  the  whole  of  Sunday, 
and  he  always  wrote  home  in  the  afternoon,  or 
brought  up  the  arrears  of  the  journal  he  had  begun 
keeping ;  but  the  Sunday  afternoon  that  followed,  he 
was  too  excited  to  stay  in  and  write.  He  thought 
he  would  go  and  take  a  walk,  and  get  away  from 
the  things  that  pestered  him.  He  did  not  watch 
where  he  was  going,  and  after  a  while  he  turned  a 
corner,  and  suddenly  found  himself  in  a  long  street, 
planted  with  shade-trees,  and  looking  old-fashioned 
and  fallen  from  a  former  dignity.  He  perceived  that 
it  could  never  have  been  fashionable,  like  Boling- 
broke  Street  or  Beacon ;  the  houses  were  narrow, 
and  their  doors  opened  from  little,  cavernous  arches 
let  into  the  brick  fronts,  and  they  stood  flush  upon 
the  pavement.  The  sidewalks  were  full  of  people, 
mostly  girls  walking  up  and  down ;  at  the  corners 
young  fellows  lounged,  and  there  were  groups  before 
the  cigar  stores  and  the  fruit  stalls,  which  were  open. 
It  was  not  very  cold  yet,  and  the  children  who 
swarmed  upon  the  low  door-steps  were  bareheaded 
and  often  summer-clad.  The  street  was  not  nearly 
so  well  kept  as  the  streets  on  the  Back  Bay  that 
Lemuel  was  more  used  to,  but.  he  could  see  that  it 
was  not  a  rowdy  street  either.  He  looked  up  at  a 
lamp  on  the  first  corner  he  came  to,  and  read 
Pleasant  Avenue  on  it;  then  he  said  that  the 'witch 


150  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

was  in  it.  He  dramatised  a  scene  of  meeting  those 
girls,  and  was  very  glib  in  it,  and  they  were  rather 
shy,  and  Miss  Dudley  kept  behind  Amanda  Grier, 
who  nudged  her  with  her  elbow  when  Lemuel  said 
he  had  come  round  to  see  if  anybody  had  robbed 
them  of  their  books  on  the  way  home  after  he  left 
them  last  night. 

But  all  the  time,  as  he  hurried  along  to  the  next 
corner,  he  looked  fearfully  to  the  right  and  left. 
Presently  he  began  to  steal  guilty  glances  at  the 
numbers  of  the  houses.  He  said  to  himself  that  he 
would  see  what  kind  of  a  looking  house  they  did 
live  in,  any  way.  It  was  only  No.  900  odd  when 
he  began,  and  he  could  turn  off  if  he  wished  long 
before  he  reached  1334.  As  he  drew  nearer  he 
said  he  would  just  give  a  look  at  it,  and  then  rush 
by.  But  1334  was  a  house  so  much  larger  and 
nicer  than  he  had  expected  that  he  stopped  to 
collect  his  slow  rustic  thoughts,  and  decide  whether 
she  really  lived  there  or  whether  she  had  just  given 
that  number  for  a  blind.  He  did  not  know  why 
he  should  think  that,  though ;  she  was  dressed  well 
enough  to  come  out  of  any  house. 

While  he  lingered  before  the  house  an  old  man 
with  a  cane  in  his  hand  and  his  mouth  hanging 
open  stopped  and  peered  through  his  spectacles, 
whose  glare  he  fixed  upon  Lemuel,  till  he  began  to 
feel  himself  a  suspicious  character.  The  old  man 
did  not  say  anything,  but  stood  faltering  upon  his 
stick  and  now  and  then  gathering  up  his  lower  lip 
as  if  he  were  going  to  speak,  but  not  speaking. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  151 

Lemuel  cleared  his  throat.  "  Hmmn  !  Is  this  a 
boarding-house  ?  " 

"  I  don't  know,"  crowed  the  old  man,  in  a  high 
senile  note.  "  You  want  table-board  or  rooms  ?  " 

"  I  don't  want  board  at  all,"  began  Lemuel  again. 

"  What  1  "  crowed  the  old  man ;  and  he  put  up 
his  hand  to  his  ear. 

People  were  beginning  to  put  their  heads  out  of  the 
neighbouring  windows,  and  to  walk  slowly  as  they 
went  by,  so  as  to  hear  what  he  and  the  old  man  were 
saying.  He  could  not  run  away  now,  and  he  went 
boldly  up  to  the  door  of  the  large  house  and  rang. 

A  girl  came,  and  he  asked  her,  with  a  flushed  face, 
if  Miss  Amanda  Grier  boarded  there ;  somehow  he 
could  not  bear  to  ask  for  Miss  Dudley. 

"  Well,"  the  girl  said,  "  she  rooms  here,"  as  if  that 
might  be  a  different  thing  to  Lemuel  altogether. 

"Oh!"  he  said.     "Is  she  in  ?  " 

"Well,  you  can  walk  in,"  said  the  girl,  "and  I  '11  see." 
She  came  back  to  ask,  "  Who  shall  I  say  called  1 " 

"  Mr.  Barker,"  said  Lemuel,  and  then  glowed 
with  shame  because  he  had  called  himself  Mister. 
The  girl  did  not  come  back,  but  she  hardly  seemed 
gone  before  'Manda  Grier  came  into  the  room.  He 
did  not  know  whether  she  would  speak  to  him,  but 
she  was  as  pleasant  as  could  be,  and  said  he  must 
come  right  up  to  her  and  S'tira's  room.  It  was 
pretty  high  up,  but  he  did  not  notice  the  stairs, 
'Manda  Grier  kept  talking  so  ;  and  when  he  got  to  it, 
and  'Manda  Grier  dashed  the  door  open,  and  told  him 
to  walk  right  in,  he  would  not  have  known  but  he 


152  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

was  in  somebody's  sitting-room.  A  curtained 
alcove  hid  the  bed,  and  the  room  was  heated  by  a 
cheerful  little  kerosene  stove;  there  were  bright 
folding  carpet-chairs,  and  the  lid  of  the  washstand 
had  a  cloth  on  it  that  came  down  to  the  floor,  and 
there  were  plants  in  the  window.  There  was  a 
mirror  on  the  wall,  framed  in  black  walnut  with 
gilt  moulding  inside,  and  a  family-group  photograph 
in  the  same  kind  of  frame,  and  two  chromes,  and  a 
clock  on  a  bracket. 

Statira  seemed  surprised  to  see  him;  the  room 
was  pretty  warm,  and  her  face  was  flushed.  He 
said  it  was  quite  mild  out,  and  she  said,  "  Was  it  1 " 
Then  she  ran  and  flung  up  the  window,  and  said, 
"Why,  so  it  was,'7  and  that  she  had  been  in  the 
house  all  day,  and  had  not  noticed  the  weather. 

She  excused  herself  and  the  room  for  being  in 
such  a  state ;  she  said  she  was  ashamed  to  be  caught 
in  such  a  looking  dress,  but  they  were  not  expecting 
company,  and  she  did  suppose  'Manda  Grier  would 
have  given  her  time  to  put  the  room  to  rights  a 
little.  He  could  not  understand  why  she  said  all 
this,  for  the  whole  room  was  clean,  and  Statira  her 
self  was  beautifully  dressed  in  the  same  dress  that 
she  had  worn  the  night  before,  or  one  just  like 
it;  and  after  she  had  put  up  the  window,  'Manda 
Grier  said,  "  S'tira  Dudley,  do  you  want  to  kill  your 
self  ?  "  and  ran  and  pulled  aside  the  curtain  in  the 
corner,  and  took  down  the  dolman  from  among  other 
clothes  that  hung  there,  and  threw  it  on  Statira's 
shoulders,  who  looked  as  pretty  as  a  pink  in  it.  But 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  153 

she  pretended  to  be  too  hot,  and  wanted  to  shrug  it 
off,  and  'Manda  Grier  called  out,  "  Mr.  Barker  !  will 
you  make  her  keep  it  on  f  and  Lemuel  sat  dumb 
and  motionless,  but  filled  through  with  a  sweet 
pleasure. 

"He  tried  several  times  to  ask  them  if  they  had 
been  robbed  on  the  way  home  last  night,  as  he  had 
done  in  the  scene  he  had  dramatised ;  but  he  could 
not  get  out  a  word  except  that  it  had  been  pretty 
warm  all  day. 

Statira  said,  "  I  think  it 's  been  a  very  warm  fall," 
and  'Manda  Grier  said,  "I  think  the  summer's  goin' 
to  spend  the  winter  with  us,"  and  they  all  three 
laughed. 

"  What  speeches  you  do  make,  'Manda  Grier,"  said 
Statira. 

"  Well,  anything  better  than  Quaker  meetin7,  / 
say/'  retorted  'Manda  Grier ;  and  then  they  were  all 
three  silent,  and  Lemuel  thought  of  his  clothes,  and 
how  fashionably  both  of  the  girls  were  dressed. 

"  I  guess,"  said  Statira,  "  it  '11  be  a  pretty  sickly 
winter,  if  it  keeps  along  this  way.  They  say  a  green 
Christmas  makes  a  fat  grave-yard." 

"  I  guess  you  '11  see  the  snow  fly  long  before 
Christmas,"  said  'Manda  Grier,  "or  Thanksgiving 
either." 

"  I  guess  so  too,"  said  Lemuel,  though  he  did  not 
like  to  seem  to  take  sides  against  Statira. 

She  laughed  as  if  it  were  a  good  joke,  and  said, 
"  'Tain'tbut  about  a  fortnight  now  till  Thanksgiving 
anyway." 


154  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

"  If  it  comes  a  good  fall  of  snow  before  Thanks- 
givin',  won't  you  come  round  and  give  us  a  sleigh-ride, 
Mr.  Barker  ?"  asked  'Manda  Grier. 

They  all  laughed  at  her  audacity,  and  Lemuel  said, 
Yes,  he  would  ;  and  she  said,  "  We  '11  give  you  a  piece 
of  real  Willoughby  Centre  Mince-pie,  if  you  will." 

They  all  laughed  again. 
"'Manda  Grier  !"  said  Statira,  in  protest. 
"  Her  folks  sent  her  half  a  dozen  last  Thanksgivin'," 
persisted  'Manda  Grier. 

"'Manda/"  pleaded  Statira. 

'Manda  Grier  sprang  up  and  got  Lemuel  a  folding 
chair.  "  You  ain't  a  bit  comfortable  in  that  stiff  old 
thing,  Mr.  Barker." 

Lemuel  declared  that  he  was  perfectly  comfortable, 
but  she  would  not  be  contented  till  he  had  changed, 
and  then  she  said,  "  Why  don't  you  look  after  your 
company,  S'tira  Dudley?  I  should 'think  you'd  be 
ashamed." 

Lemuel's  face  burned  with  happy  shame,  and  Sta 
tira,  who  was  as  red  as  he  was,  stole  a  look  at  him, 
that  seemed  to  say  that  there  was  no  use  trying  to 
stop  'Manda  Grier.  But  when  she  went  on,  "  I  don't 
know  but  it 's  the  fashion  to  Willoughby  Centre," 
they  both  gave  way  again,  and  laughed  more  than 
ever,  and  Statira  said,  "  Well,  'Manda  Grier,  what  do 
you  s'pose  Mr.  Barker '11  think?" 

She  tried  to  be  sober,  but  the  wild  girl  set  her  and 
Lemuel  off  laughing  when  she  retorted,  "  Guess  he  '11 
think  what  he  did  when  he  was  brought  up  in  court 
for  highway  robbery." 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  155 

'Manda  Grier  sat  upright  in  her  chair,  and  acted  as 
if  she  had  merely  spoken  about  the  weather.  He 
knew  that  she  was  talking  that  way  just  to  break  the 
'ice,  and  though  he  would  have  given  anything  to  be 
able  to  second  her,  he  could  not. 

"How  you  do  carry  on,  'Manda  Grier,"  said  Statira, 
as  helpless  as  he  was. 

"Guess  I  got  a  pretty  good  load  to  carry  !"  said 
'Manda  Grier. 

They  all  now  began  to  find  their  tongues  a  little, 
and  Statira  told  how  one  season  when  her  mother 
took  boarders  she  had  gone  over  to  the  Pastures  with 
a  party  of  summer-folks  on  a  straw-ride  and  picked 
blueberries.  She  said  she  never  saw  the  berries  as 
thick  as  they  were  there. 

Lemuel  said  he  guessed  he  knew  where  the 
place  was;  but  the  fire  had  got  into  it  last  year, 
and  there  had  not  been  a  berry  there  this  summer. 

Statira  said,  "  What  a  shame  !"  She  said  there  were 
some  Barkers  over  East  Willoughby  way ;  and  she 
confessed  that  when  he  said  his  name  was  Barker, 
and  he  was  from  Willoughby  Pastures,  that  night  in 
the  station,  she  thought  she  should  have  gone 
through  the  floor. 

Then  they  talked  a  little  about  how  they  had  both 
felt,  but  not  very  much,  and  they  each  took  all  the 
blame,  and  would  not  allow  that  the  other  was  the 
least  to  blame.  Statira  said  she  had  behaved  like  & 
perfect  coot  all  the  way  through,  and  Lemuel  said 
that  he  guessed  he  had  been  the  coot,  if  there 
was  any. 


156  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"I  guess  there  was  a  pair  of  yon,"  said  'Manda 
Grier;  and  at  this  association  of  them  in  'Manda 
Grier's  condemnation,  he  could  see  that  Statira  was 
blushing,  though  she  hid  her  face  in  her  hands,  for 
her  ears  were  all  red. 

He  now  rose  and  said  he  guessed  he  would  have 
to  be  going ;  but  when  'Manda  Grier  interposed  and 
asked,  "Why,  what 's  your  hurry  1"  he  said  he  guessed 
he  had  not  had  any,  and  Statira  laughed  at  the  wit 
of  this  till  it  seemed  to  him  she  would  perish. 

"Well,  then,  you  set" right  straight  down  again," 
said  'Manda  Grier,  with  mock  severity,  as  if  he  were 
an  obstinate  little  boy ;  and  he  obeyed,  though  he 
wished  that  Statira  had  asked  him  to  stay  too. 

"  Why,  the  land  sakes  ! "  exclaimed  'Manda  Grier, 
"  have  you  been  lettin'  him  keep  his  hat  all  this  while, 
S'tira  Dudley  ?  You  take  it  right  away  from  him  !  " 
And  Statira  rose,  all  smiling  and  blushing,  and  said — 

"  Will  you  let  me  take  your  hat,  Mr.  Barker  ? "  as 
if  he  had  just  come  in,  and  made  him  feel  as  if  she 
had  pressed  him  to  stay.  She  took  it  and  went  and 
laid  it  on  a  stand  across  the  room,  and  Lemuel  thought 
he  had  never  seen  a  much  more  graceful  person. 
She  wore  a  full  Breton  skirt,  which  was  gathered 
thickly  at  the  hips,  and  swung  loose  and  free  as  she 
stepped.  When  she  came  back  and  sat  down,  letting 
the  back  of  one  pretty  hand  fall  into  the  palm  of  the 
other  in  her  lap,  it  seemed  to  him  impossible  that 
such  an  elegant  young  lady  should  be  tolerating  a 
person  dressed  as  he  was. 

"There!"   began  'Manda  Grier.     "/  guess  Mr. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     157 

Barker  won't  object  a  great  deal  to  our  going  on,  if 
it  is  Sunday.  'S  kind  of  a  Sunday  game,  anyways. 
You  'posed  to  games  on  Sunday  ]  " 

"I  don't  know  as  I  am,"  said  Lemuel. 

"  Now,  'Manda  Grier,  don't  you  !  "  pleaded  Statira. 

"  Shall,  too,"  persisted  'Manda.  "  I  guess  if  there  's 
any  harm  in  the  key,  there  ain't  any  harm  in  the 
Bible,  and  so  it  comes  out  even.  D  'you  ever  try 
your  fate  with  a  key  and  a  Bible  ]  "  she  asked  Lemuel. 

"  I  don't  know  as  I  did,"  he  answered. 

"Well,  it's  real  fun,  V  its  curious  how  it  comes 
out,  oftentimes.  Well,  1  don't  s'pose  there's  any 
thing  in  it,  but  it  is  curious." 

"  I  guess  we  hadn't  better,"  said  Statira.  "  I  don't 
believe  Mr.  Barker  '11  care  for  it." 

Lemuel  said  he  would  like  to  see  how  it  was  clone, 
anyway. 

'Manda  Grier  took  the  key  out  of  the  door,  and 
looked  at  it.  "That  key '11  cut  the  leaves  all  to 
pieces." 

"  Can't  you  find  some  other  1 "  suggested  Statira. 

"I  don't  know  but  may  be  I  could,"  said  'Manda 
Grier.  "  You  just  wait  a  half  a  second." 

Before  Lemuel  knew  what  she  was  doing,  she 
flew  out  of  the  door,  and  he  could  hear  her  flying 
down  the  stairs. 

"  Well,  I  must  say  !  "  said  Statira,  and  then  neither 
she  nor  Lemuel  said  anything  for  a  little  while.  At 
last  she  asked,  "That  window  trouble  you  any  ?  " 

Lemuel  said,  "  Not  at  all,"  and  he  added,  "  Perhaps 
it 's  too  cold  for  you  1  " 


158  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

"  Oh  no,"  said  the  girl,  "  I  can't  seem  to  get  any 
thing  too  cold  for  me.  I  'm  the  greatest  person  for 
cold  weather  !  I  'm  real  glad  it 's  comin'  winter.  We 
had  the  greatest  time,  last  winter,"  continued  Statira, 
"  with  those  English  sparrows.  Used  to  feed  'em 
crumbs,  there  on  the  window-sill,  and  it  seemed  as 
if  they  got  to  know  we  girls,  and  they  'd  hop  right 
inside,  if  you  'd  let  'em.  Used  to  make  me  feel  kind 
of  creepy  to  have  'em.  They  say  it 's  a  sign  of  death 
to  have  a  bird  come  into  your  room,  and  I  was 
always  for  drivin'  'em  out,  but  'Manda,  she  said  she 
guessed  the  Lord  didn't  take  the  trouble  to  send 
birds  round  to  every  one,  and  if  the  rule  didn't  work 
one  way  it  didn't  work  the  other.  You  believe  in 
signs  ? " 

"  I  don't  know  as  I  do,  much.  Mother  likes  to 
see  the  new  moon  over  her  right  shoulder,  pretty 
well,"  said  Lemuel. 

"Well,  I  declare,"  said  Statira,  "that's  just  the 
way  with  my  aunt.  Now  you  're  up  here,"  she  said, 
springing  suddenly  to  her  feet,  "  I  want  you  should 
see  what  a  nice  view  we  got  from  our  window." 

Lemuel  had  it  on  his  tongue  to  say  that  he  hoped 
it  was  not  going  to  be  his  last  chance  ;  he  believed  he 
would  have  said  it  if  'Manda  Grier  had  been  there ; 
but  now  he  only  joined  Statira  at  the  window,  and 
looked  out.  They  had  to  stoop  over,  and  get  pretty 
close  together,  to  see  the  things  she  wished  to  show 
him,  and  she  kept  shrugging  her  sack  on,  and  once 
she  touched  him  with  her  shoulder.  He  said  yes  to 
everything  she  asked  him  about  the  view,  but  he  saw 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     159 

very  little  of  it.  He  saw  that  her  hair  had  a  shade 
of  gold  in  its  brown,  and  that  it  curled  in  tight  little 
rings  where  it  was  cut  on  her  neck,  and  that  her  skin 
was  very  white  under  it.  When  she  touched  him, 
that  time,  it  made  him  feel  very  strange ;  and  when 
she  glanced  at  him  out  of  her  blue  eyes,  he  did  not 
know  what  he  was  doing.  He  did  not  laugh  as  he 
did  when  'Manda  Grier  was  there. 

Statira  said,  "  Oh,  excuse  me  ! "  when  she  touched 
him,  and  he  answered,  "  Perfectly  excusable,"  but  he 
said  hardly  anything  else.  He  liked  to  hear  her  talk, 
and  he  watched  the  play  of  her  lips  as  she  spoke. 
Once  her  breath  came  across  his  cheek,  when  she 
turned  quickly  to  see  if  he  was  looking  where  she 
was  pointing. 

They  sat  down  and  talked,  and  all  at  once  Statira 
exclaimed,  "  Well !  I  should  think  'Manda  Grier  was 
makin'  that  key  !  " 

Now,  whatever  happened,  Lemuel  was  bound  to 
say,  "I  don't  think  she  's  been  gone  very  long." 

"Well,  you're  pretty  patient,  I  must  say,"  said 
Statira,  and  he  did  not  know  whether  she  was  making 
fun  of  him  or  not.  He  tried  to  think  of  something 
to  say,  but  could  not.  "  I  hope  she  '11  fetch  a  lamp, 
too,  when  she  comes,"  Statira  went  on,  and  now  he 
saw  that  it  was  beginning  to  be  a  little  darker. 
Perhaps  that  about  the  lamp  was  a  hint  for  him  to 
go ;  but  he  did  not  see  exactly  how  he  could  go  till 
'Manda  Grier  came  back ;  he  felt  that  it  would  not 
be  polite. 

"  Well,  there  !  "  said  Statira,  as  if  she  divined  his 


160  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

feeling.  I  shall  give  'Manda  Grier  a  good  tal king- 
to.  I'm  awfully  afraid  we're  keeping  you,  Mr. 
Barker." 

"Not  at  all,"  said  Lemuel;  "I'm  afraid  I'm 
keeping  you" 

"  Oh,  not  at  all,"  said  Statira.  She  became  rather 
quieter,  till  'Manda  Grier  came  back. 

'Manda  Grier  burst  into  the  room,  with  a  key  in 
one  hand  and  a  lamp  in  the  other.  "  Well,  I  knew 
you  two  'd  be  holdin'  Quaker's  meetin'." 

"  We  hain't  at  all !  How  d'  you  know  we  have  ] 
Have  we,  Mr.  Barker  1 "  returned  Statira,  in  simul 
taneous  admission  and  denial. 

"Well,  if  you  want  to  know,  I  listened  outside 
the  door,"  said  'Manda  Grier,  "  and  you  wa'n't  sayin' 
a  word,  either  of  you.  I  guess  I  got  a  key  now  that  '11 
do,"  she  added,  setting  down  her  lamp,  "and  I 
borrowed  an  old  Bible  't  I  guess  'tain't  go'n'  to  hurt 
a  great  deal." 

"I  don't  know  as  I  want  to  play  it  much,"  said 
Statira. 

"Well,  I  guess  you  got  to,  now,"  said  'Manda 
Grier,  "  after  all  my  trouble.  Hain't  she,  Mr. 
Barker  1 " 

It  flattered  Lemuel  through  and  through  to  be 
appealed  to,  but  he  could  not  say  anything. 

"  Well,"  said  Statira,  "  if  I  got  to,  I  got  to.  But 
you  got  to  hold  the  Bible." 

"  You  got  to  put  the  key  in  ! "  cried  'Manda  Grier. 
She  sat  holding  the  Bible  open  toward  Statira. 

She   offered  to  put   the   key    in,    and    then    she 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     161 

stopped.     "Well!  I'm  great!     Who  are  we  going 
to  find  it  for  first  1  " 

"  Oh,  company  first,"  said  'Manda  Grier. 

'You  company,  Mr.  Barker?"  asked  Statira, 
looking  at  Lemuel  over  her  shoulder, 

"  I  hope  not,"  said  Lemuel  gallantly,  at  last. 

"  Well,  I  declare  !  "  said  Statira. 

"  Quite  one  the  family,"  said  'Manda  Grier,  and 
that  made  Statira  say,  "  'Manda ! "  and  Lemuel 
blush  to  his  hair.  "  Well,  anyway,"  continued 
'Manda  Grier,  "you're  company  enough  to  have 
your  fate  found  first.  Put  in  the  key,  S'tira." 

"No,  IshaVtdoit." 

"  Well,  /  shall,  then  ! "  She  took  the  key  from 
Statira,  and  shut  the  book  upon  it  at  the  Song  of 
Solomon,  and  bound  it  tightly  in  with  a  ribbon. 
Lemuel  watched  breathlessly ;  he  was  not  sure  that 
he  knew  what  kind  of  fate  she  meant,  but  he 
thought  he  knew,  and  it  made  his  heart  beat  quick. 
'Manda  Grier  had  passed  the  ribbon  through  the 
ring  of  the  key,  which  was  left  outside  of  the  leaves, 
and  now  she  took  hold  of  the  key  with  her  two 
forefingers.  "You  got  to  be  careful  not  to  touch 
the  Bible  with  your  fingers,"  she  explained,  "or  the 
charm  won't  work.  Now  I  '11  say  over  two  verses, 
't  where  the  key 's  put  in,  and  Mr.  Barker,  you  got 
to  repeat  the  alphabet  at  the  same  time  ;  and  when 
it  comes  to  the  first  letter  of  the  right  name,  the 
Bible  will  drop  out  of  my  fingers,  all  I  can  do.  Now 
then  !  Set  me  as  a  seal  on  thine  heart " 

"A,  B,  C,  D."  began  Lemuel. 
L 


162  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"Pshaw,  now,  'Manda  Grier,  you  stop!"  pleaded 
Statira. 

"You  be  still!  Go  on,  Mr.  Barker! — As  a  seal 
upon  thine  arm ;  far  love  is  as  strong  as  death — don't 
say  the  letters  so  fast — jealousy  as  cruel  as  the  grave 
— don't  look  at  S'tira ;  look  at  me  ! — the  coals  thereof 
are  coals  of  fire — you're  sayin'  it  too  slow  now — 
which  hath  a  most  vehement  flame.  I  declare,  S'tira 
Dudley,  if  you  joggle  me  ! — Many  waters  cannot  quench 
love  ;  neither  can  the  floods  drown  it — you  must  put 
just  so  much  time  between  every  letter;  if  you  stop 
on  every  particular  one,  it  ain't  fair — if  a  man  icould 
give  all  the  substance  of  his  house  for  love — you  stop 
laughin',  you  two  ! — it  would  be  utterly  consumed. 
Well,  there  !  Now  we  got  to  go  it  all  over  again, 
and  my  arm  's  most  broke  now" 

"  I  don't  believe  Mr.  Barker  wants  to  do  it  again," 
said  Statira,  looking  demurely  at  him  ;  but  Lemuel 
protested  that  he  did,  and  the  game  began  again. 
This  time  the  Bible  began  to  shake  at  the  letter  D, 
and  Statira  cried  out,  "  Xow,  'Manda  Grier,  you  're 
making  it,"  and  'Manda  Grier  laughed  so  that  she 
could  scarcely  hold  the  book.  Lemuel  laughed  too ; 
but  he  kept  on  repeating  the  letters.  At  S  the  book 
fell  to  the  floor,  and  Statira  caught  it  up,  and 
softly  beat  'Manda  Grier  on  the  back  with  it.  "  Oh 
you  mean  thing  !  "  she  cried  out.  "  You  did  it  on 
purpose." 

'Manda  Grier  was  almost  choked  with  laughing. 

"Do  you  know  anybody  of  the  name  of  Sarah, 
Mr.  Barker  ?  "  she  gasped,  and  then  they  all  laughed 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     163 

together  till  Statira  said,  "  Well,  I  shall  surely  die  ! 
Now,  'Manda  Grier,  it  's  your  turn.  And  you  see 
if  I  don't  pay  you  up." 

"I  guess  I  ain't  afraid  any,"  retorted  'Manda 
Grier.  "  The  book  '11  do  \vhat  it  pleases,  in  spite  of 
you." 

They  began  again,  Statira  holding  the  book  this 
time,  and  Lemuel  repeating  as  before,  and  he  went 
quite  through  the  alphabet  without  anything  happen 
ing.  "  Well,  I  declare  ! "  said  Statira,  looking  grave. 
"  Let 's  try  it  over  again." 

"  You  may  try,  and  you  may  try,  and  you  may 
try,"  said  'Manda  Grier.  "  It  won't  do  you  any 
good.  I  hain't  got  any  fate  in  that  line." 

"Well,  that's  what  we  're  goin'  to  find  out,"  said 
Statira ;  but  again  the  verses  and  alphabet  were 
repeated  without  effect. 

"  Now  you  satisfied  ] "  asked  'Manda  Grier. 

"  No,  not  yet.     Begin  again,  Mr.  Barker  !  " 

He  did  so,  and  at  the  second  letter  the  book 
dropped.  Statira  jumped  up,  and  'Manda  Grier 
began  to  chase  her  round  the  room,  to  box  her  ears 
for  her,  she  said.  Lemuel  sat  looking  on.  He  did 
not  feel  at  all  severe  toward  them,  as  he  usually  did 
toward  girls  that  cut  up ;  he  did  not  feel  that  this 
was  cutting  up,  in  fact. 

"  Stop,  stop  ! "  implored  Statira,  "  and  I  '11  let  you 
try  it  over  again." 

"  No,  it 's  your  turn  now  !  " 

"  No,  I  ain't  going  to  have  any,"  said  Statira, 
foldiag  her  arms. 


164  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

"  You  got  to,"  said  'Manda  Grier.  "  The  rest  of 
us  has,  and  now  you  Ve  got  to.  Hain't  she  got  to, 
Mr.  Barker  1 " 

"Yes,"  said  Lemuel  delightedly ;  "  you  Ve  got  to, 
Miss  Dudley." 

"  Miss  Dudley  !  "  repeated  'Manda  Grier.  "  How 
that  does  sound." 

"  I  don't  know  as  it  sounds  any  worse  than  Mr. 
Barker,"  said  Lemuel. 

"Well,"  said  'Manda  Grier  judicially,  "I  sli'd 
think  it  was  'bout  time  they  was  both  of  'em  dropped. 
'T  any  rate,  I  don't  want  you  should  call  me  Miss 
Grier — Lemuel." 

"Oh!"  cried  Statira.  "Well,  you  are  getting 
along,  'Manda  Grier  !  " 

"Well,  don't  you  let  yourself  be  outdone  then, 
S'tira," 

"I  guess  Mr.  Barker  's  good  enough  for  me  a  while 
yet,"  said  Statira,  and  she  hastened  to  add,  "  The 
name,  I  mean,"  and  at  this  they  all  laughed  till 
Statira  said,  "  I  shall  certainty  die  ! "  She  suddenly 
recovered  herself — those  girls  seemed  to  do  every 
thing  like  lightning,  Lemuel  observed — and  said, 
"  No,  I  ain't  goin'  to  have  mine  told  at  all.  I  don't 
like  it.  Seems  kind  of  wicked.  I  rather  talk.  I 
never  could  make  it  just  right  to  act  so  with  the 
Bible." 

Lemuel,  was  pleased  at  that.  Statira  seemed 
prettier  than  ever  in  this  mood  of  reverence. 

"  Well,  don't  talk  too  much  when  I  'm  gone,"  said 
'Manda  Grier,  and  before  anybody  could  stop  her, 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  165 

she  ran  out  of  the  room.  But  she  put  her  head  in 
again  to  say,  "  I  '11  be  back  as  soon 's  I  can  take  this 
key  home." 

Lemuel  did  not  know  what  to  do.  The  thought 
of  being  alone  with  Statira  again  was  full  of  rapture 
and  terror.  He  was  glad  when  she  seized  the  door 
and  tried  to  keep  'Manda  Grier. 

"  I — I — guess  I  better  be  going,"  he  said. 

"You  sha'n't  go  till  I  get  back,  anyway,"  said 
'Manda  Grier  hospitably.  "You  keep  him,  S'tira  !" 

She  gave  Statira  a  little  push,  and  ran  down  the 
stairs. 

Statira  tottered  against  Lemuel,  with  that  round, 
soft  shoulder  which  had  touched  him  before.  He 
put  out  his  arms  to  save  her  from  falling,  and  they 
seemed  to  close  round  her  of  themselves.  She  threw 
up  her  face,  and  in  a  moment  he  had  kissed  her. 
He  released  her  and  fell  back  from  her  aghast. 

She  looked  at  him. 

"  I — I  didn't  mean  to,"  he  panted.  His  heart  was 
thundering  in  his  ears. 

She  put  up  her  hands  to  her  face,  and  began  to 
cry. 

"  Oh,  my  goodness  !  "  he  gasped.  He  wavered  a 
moment,  then  he  ran  out  of  the  room. 

On  the  stairs  he  met  'Manda  Grier  coming  up. 
"  Now,  Mr.  Barker,  you  're  real  mean  to  go  ! "  she 
pouted. 

"I  guess  I  better  be  going,"  Lemuel  called  back, 
in  a  voice  so  husky  that  he  hardly  knew  it  for  his 
own. 


xn. 

LEMUEL  let  himself  into  Miss  Vane's  house  with 
his  key  to  the  back  gate,  and  sat  down,  still  throb 
bing,  in  his  room  over  the  L,  and  tried  to  get  the 
nature  of  his  deed,  or  misdeed,  before  his  mind. 
He  had  grown  up  to  manhood  in  an  austere  reverence 
for  himself  as  regarded  the  other  sex,  and  in  a  secret 
fear,  as  exacting^for  them  as  it  was  worshipful  of 
women.  His  mother  had  held  all  show  of  love- 
sickness  between  young  people  in  scorn  ;  she  said 
they  were  silly  things,  when  she  saw  them  soft  upon 
one  another ;  and  Lemuel  had  imbibed  from  her  a 
sense  of  unlawfulness,  of  shame,  in  the  love-making 
he  had  seen  around  him  all  his  life.  These  things 
are  very  open  in  the  country.  Even  in  large  villages 
they  have  kissing-games  at  the  children's  parties,  in 
the  church  vestries  and  refectories ;  and  as  a  little 
boy  Lemuel  had  taken  part  in  such  games.  But  as 
he  grew  older,  his  reverence  and  his  fear  would  not 
let  him  touch  a  girl.  Once  a  big  girl,  much  older 
than  he,  came  up  behind  him  in  the  play-ground  and 
kissed  him ;  he  rubbed  the  kiss  off  with  his  hand, 
and  scoured  the  place  with  sand  and  gravel.  One 

166 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     167 

winter  all  the  big  boys  and  girls  at  school  began 
courting  whenever  the  teacher  was  out  of  sight  a 
moment ;  at  'the  noon-spell  some  of  them  sat  with 
their  arms  round  one  another.  Lemuel  wandered 
off  by  himself  in  the  snows  of  the  deep  woods; 
the  sight  of  such  things,  the  thought  of  them  put 
him  to  shame  for  those  fools,  as  he  tacitly  called 
them;  and  now  what  had  he  done  himself]  He 
could  not  tell.  At  times  he  was  even  proud  and  glad 
of  it ;  and  then  he  did  not  know  what  would  become 
of  him.  But  mostly  it  seemed  to  him  that  he  had 
been  guilty  of  an  enormity  that  nothing  could  ever 
excuse.  He  must  have  been  crazy  to  do  such  a 
thing  to  a  young  lady  like  that ;  her  tear-stained  face 
looked  her  wonder  at  him  still. 

By  this  time  she  had  told  'Manda  Grier  all  about 
it ;  and  he  dared  not  think  what  their  thoughts  of  him 
must  be.  It  seemed  to  him  that  he  ought  to  put  such  a 
monster  as  he  was  out  of  the  world.  But  all  the  time 
there  was  a  sweetness,  a  joy  in  his  heart,  that  made 
him  half  frantic  with  fear  of  himself. 

"Lemuel!" 

He  started  up  at  the  sound  of  Sibyl  Yane's  voice 
calling  to  him  from  the  dining-room  which  opened 
into  the  L. 

"  Yes,  ma'am,"  he  answered  tremulously,  going  to 
his  door.  Miss  Yane  had  been  obliged  to  instruct 
him  to  say  ma'am  to  her  niece,  whom  he  had  at  first 
spoken  of  by  her  Christian  name. 

"Was that  you  came  in  a  little  while  ago  ? " 

"Yes,  ma'am,  I  came  in." 


168  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

"  Oh  !     And  have  you  had  your  supper  ?  " 
"  I — I  guess  I  don't  want  any  supper." 

"  Don't  want  any  supper  1  You  will  be  ill.  Why 
don't  you  1 " 

"  I  don't  know  as  I  feel  just  like  eating  anything." 

"  Well,  it  won't  do.  Will  you  see,  please,  if  Jane 
is  in  the  kitchen  1  " 

Lemuel  came  forward,  full  of  his  unfitness  for  the 
sight  of  men,  but  gathering  a  little  courage  when  he 
found  the  dining-room  so  dark.  He  descended  to 
the  basement  and  opened  the  door  of  the  kitchen, 
looked  in,  and  shut  it  again.  "Yes,  ma'am,  she's 
there," 

"  Oh  !  "  Sibyl  seemed  to  hesitate.  Then  she  said  : 
"Light  the  gas  down  there,  hadn't  you  better  ?  " 

"  I  don't  know  but  I  had,"  Lemuel  assented. 

But  before  he  could  obey,  "  And  Lemuel  ! "  she 
called  down  again,  "  come  and  light  it  up  here  too, 
please." 

"  I  will  as  soon  as  I  've  lit  it  here,"  said  Lemuel. 

An  imperious  order  came  back.  "  You  will  light 
it  here  noiv,  please." 

"  All  right,"  assented  Lemuel.  When  he  appeared 
in  the  upper  entry  and  flashed  the  gas  up,  he  saw 
Sibyl  standing  at  the  reception-room  door,  with  her 
finger  closed  into  a  book  which  she  had  been  reading. 

"  You  're  not  to  say  that  you  will  do  one  thing 
when  you're  told  to  do  another." 

Lemuel  whitened  a  little  round  the  lips.  "I'm 
not  to  do  two  things  at  once,  either,  I  suppose." 

Sibyl  ignored  this  reply.     "  Please  go  and  get  your 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     169 

supper,  and  when  you  Ve  had  it  come  up  here  again. 
I  Ve  some  things  for  you  to  do." 

"Ill  do  them  now,"  said  Lemuel  fiercely.  "I 
don't  want  any  supper,  and  I  sha'n't  eat  any." 

"Why,  Lemuel,  what  is  the  matter  with  you?" 
asked  the  girl,  in  the  sudden  effect  of  motherly 
solicitude.  "You  look  very  strange,  you  seem  so 
excited." 

"I  'm  not  hungry,  that 's  all,"  said  the  boy  doggedly. 
"  What  is  it  you  want  done  ? >J 

"  Won't  you  please  go  up  to  the  third  floor,"  said 
Sibyl,  in  a  phase  of  timorous  dependence,  "  and  see 
if  everything  is  right  there  1  I  thought  I  heard  a 
noise.  See  if  the  windows  are  fast,  won't  you  1 " 

Lemuel  turned  and  she  followed  with  her  finger  in 
her  book,  and  her  book  pressed  to  her  heart,  talking. 
"  It  seemed  to  me  that  I  heard  steps  and  voices.  It 's 
very  mysterious.  I  suppose  any  one  could  plant  a 
ladder  on  the  roof  of  the  L  part,  and  get  into  the 
windows  if  they  were  not  fastened." 

"  Have  to  be  a  pretty  long  ladder,"  grumbled 
Lemuel. 

"Yes,"  Sibyl  assented,  "it  would.  And  it  didn't 
sound  exactly  like  burglars." 

She  followed  him  half-way  up  the  second  flight  of 
stairs,  and  stood  there  while  he  explored  the  third 
story  throughout. 

"  There  ain't  anything  there,"  he  reported  without 
looking  at  her,  and  was  about  to  pass  her  on  the 
stairs  in  going  down. 

"  Oh,  thank  you  very  much,  Lemuel,"  she  said, 


170  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

with  fervent  gratitude  in  her  voice.  She  fetched  a 
tremulous  sigh.  "  I  suppose  it  was  nothing.  Yes," 
she  added  hoarsely,  "it  must  have  been  nothing. 
Oh,  let  me  go  down  first !  "  she  cried,  putting  out  her 
hand  to  stop  him  from  passing  her.  She  resumed 
when  they  reached  the  ground  floor  again.  "  Aunty 
has  gone  out,  and  Jane  was  in  the  kitchen,  and  it 
began  to  grow  dark  while  I  sat  reading  in  the  draw 
ing-room,  and  all  at  once  I  heard  the  strangest  noise." 
Her  voice  dropped  deeply  on  the  last  word.  "  Yes, 
it  was  very  strange  indeed  !  Thank  you,  Lemuel," 
she  concluded. 

"  Quite  welcome,"  said  Lemuel  dryly,  pushing  on 
towards  the  basement  stairs. 

"  Oh  !  And  Lemuel !  will  you  let  Jane  give  you 
your  supper  in  the  dining-room,  so  that  you  could  be 
here  if  I  heard  anything  else  1  " 

"  I  don't  want  any  supper,"  said  Lemuel. 
The  girl  scrutinised  him  with  an  expression  of 
misgiving.  Then,  with  a  little  sigh,  as  of  one  who 
will  not  explore  a  painful  mystery,  she  asked : 
"  Would  you  mind  sitting  in  the  dining-room,  then, 
till  aunty  gets  back  1 " 

"  I  'd  just  as  lives  sit  there,"  said  Lemuel,  walking 
into  the  dark  dining-room  and  sitting  down. 

u  Oh,  thank  you  very  much.  Aunty  will  be  back 
very  soon,  I  suppose.  She 's  just  gone  to  the  Sewells' 
to  tea." 

She  followed  him  to  the  threshold.  "  You  must — 
I  must — light  the  gas  in  here  for  you." 

"  Guess  I  can  light  the  gas,"  said  Lemuel,  getting 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     171 

up  to  intercept  her  in  this  service.  She  had  run 
into  the  reception-room  for  a  match,  and  she  would 
not  suffer  him  to  prevent  her. 

"  No,  no  !  I  insist !  And  Lemuel,"  she  said, 
turning  upon  him,  "I  must  ask  you  to  excuse  my 
speaking  harshly  to  you.  I  was — agitated." 

"  Perfectly  excusable,"  said  Lemuel. 

"  I  am  afraid,"  said  the  girl,  fixing  him  with  her 
eyes,  "that  you  are  not  well." 

"  Oh  yes,  I  'm  well.    I  'm— pretty  tired;  that's  all." 

"  Have  you  been  walking  far  1 " 

"Yes — not  very." 

"  The  walking  ought  to  do  you  good,"  said  Sibyl, 
with  serious  thoughtfulness.  "I  think,"  she  con 
tinued,  "  you  had  better  have  some  bryonia.  Don't 
you  think  you  had  ? " 

"  No,  no  !  I  don't  want  anything,"  protested 
Lemuel. 

She  looked  at  him  with  a  feeling  of  baffled  anxiety 
painted  on  her  face ;  and  as  she  turned  away,  she 
beamed  with  a  fresh  inspiration.  "  I  will  get  you  a 
book."  She  flew  into  the  reception-room  and -back 
again,  but  she  only  had  the  book  that  she  had  herself 
been  reading. 

"Perhaps  you  would  like  to  read  this 7  I've 
finished  it.  I  was  just  looking  back  through  it." 

"  Thank  you ;  I  guess  I  don't  want  to  read  any, 
just  now." 

She  leaned  against  the  side  of  the  dining-table, 
beyond  which  Lemuel  sat,  and  searched  his  fallen 
countenance  with  a  glance  contrived  to  be  at  once 


172  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

piercing  and  reproachful.  "I  see/' she  said,  "you 
have  not  forgiven  me." 

"Forgiven  you?  "  repeated  Lemuel  blankly. 

"  Yes — for  giving  way  to  my  agitation  in  speaking 
to  you." 

"  I  don't  know,"  said  Lemuel,  with  a  sigh  of  deep 
inward  trouble,  "as  I  noticed  anything." 

"I  told  you  to  light  the  gas  in  the  basement," 
suggested  Sibyl,  "  and  then  I  told  you  to  light  it  up 
here,  and  then — I  scolded  you." 

"  Oh  yes,"  admitted  Lemuel :  "that,"  He  dropped 
his  head  again. 

Sibyl  sank  upon  the  edge  of  a  chair.  "  Lemuel ! 
you  have  something  on  your  mind  !  " 

The  boy  looked  up  with  a  startled  face. 

"Yes!  I  can  see  that  you  have,"  pursued  Sibyl 
"What  have  you  been  doing?"  she  demanded 
sternly. 

Lemuel  was  so  full  of  the  truth  that  it  came  first 
to  his  lips  in  all  cases.  He  could  scarcely  force  it 
aside  now  with  the  evasion  that  availed  him  nothing. 
"I  don't  know  as  I've  been  doing  anything  in 
particular." 

"  I  see  that  you  don't  wish  to  tell  me  !  "  cried  the 
girl.  "But  you  might  have  trusted  me.  I  would 
have  defended  you,  no  matter  what  you  had  done — 
the  worse  the  better." 

Lemuel  hung  his  head  without  answering. 

After  a  while  she  continued  :  "  If  I  had  been  that 
girl  who  had  you  arrested,  and  I  had  been  the  cause 
of  so  much  suffering  to  an  innocent  person,  I  should 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  173 

never  have  forgiven  myself.  I  should  have  devoted 
my  life  to  expiation.  I  should  have  spent  my  life  in 
going  about  the  prisons,  and  finding  out  persons  who 
were  unjustly  accused.  I  should  have  done  it  as  a 
penance.  Yes  !  even  if  he  had  been  guilty  !  " 

Lemuel  remained  insensible  to  this  extreme  of 
self-sacrifice,  and  she  went  on  :  "  This  book — it  is  a 
story — is  all  one  picture  of  such  a  nature.  There  is 
a  girl  who  's  been  brought  up  as  the  ward  of  a  young 
man.  He  educates  her,  and  she  expects  to  be  his 
wife,  and  he  turns  out  to  be  perfectly  false  and  un 
worthy  in  every  way ;  but  she  marries  him  all  the 
same,  although  she  likes  some  one  else,  because  she 
feels  that  she  ought  to  punish  herself  for  thinking  of 
another,  and  because  she  hopes  that  she  will  die  soon, 
and  when  her  guardian  finds  out  what  she 's  done  for 
him,  it  will  reform  him.  It 's  perfectly  sublime.  It 's 
— ennobling  !  If  every  one  could  read  this  book, 
they  would  be  very  different." 

"I  don't  see  much  sense  in  it,"  said  Lemuel, 
goaded  to  this  comment. 

"  You  would  if  you  read  it.  When  she  dies — she 
is  killed  by  a  fall  from  her  horse  in  hunting,  and  has 
just  time  to  join  the  hands  of  her  husband  and  the 
man  she  liked  first,  and  tell  them  everything — it  is 
wrought  up  so  that  you  hold  your  breath.  I  suppose 
it  was  reading  that  that  made  me  think  there  were 
burglars  getting  in.  But  perhaps  you  're  right  not 
to  read  it  now,  if  you  're  excited  already.  I  '11  get  you 
something  cheerful."  She  whirled  out  of  the  room  and 
back  in  a  series  of  those  swift,  nervous  movements 


174  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

peculiar  to  her.  "  There  !  that  will  amuse  you,  I 
know."  She  put  the  book  down  on  the  table  before 
Lemuel,  who  silently  submitted  to  have  it  left  there. 
"  It  will  distract  your  thoughts,  if  anything  will. 
And  I  shall  ask  you  to  let  me  sit  just  here  in  the 
reception-room,  so  that  I  can  call  you  if  I  feel 
alarmed." 

"  All  right,"  said  Lemuel,  lapsing  absently  to  his 
own  troubled  thoughts. 

"  Thank  you  very  much,"  said  Sibyl.  She  went 
away,  and  came  back  directly.  "  Don't  you  think," 
she  asked,  "  that  it  ;s  very  strange  you  should  never 
have  seen  or  heard  anything  of  her  1 " 

"  Heard  of  who  1 "  he  asked,  dragging  himself 
painfully  up  from  the  depths  of  his  thoughts. 

"That  heartless  girl  who  had  you  arrested." 

"  She  wasn't  heartless ! "  retorted  Lemuel  in 
dignantly. 

"You  think  so  because  you  are  generous,  and 
can't  imagine  such  heartlessness.  Perhaps,"  added 
Sibyl,  with  the  air  of  being  illumined  by  a  happy 
thought,  "she  is  dead.  That  would  account  for 
everything.  She  may  have  died  of  remorse.  It 
probably  preyed  upon  her  till  she  couldn't  bear  it 
any  longer,  and  then  she  killed  herself." 

Lemuel  began  to  grow  red  at  the  first  apprehension 
of  her  meaning.  As  she  went  on,  he  changed  colour 
more  and  more. 

"She  is  alive  !"  cried  Sibyl.  "She's  alive,  and 
you  have  seen  her  !  You  needn't  deny  it !  You've 
seen  her  to-day  !  " 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     175 

Lemuel  rose  in  clumsy  indignation.  "I  don't 
know  as  anybody  Js  got  any  right  to  say  what  I  've 
done,  or  haven't  done." 

"  0  Lemuel !  "  cried  Sibyl.  "  Do  you  think  any 
one  in  this  house  would  intrude  in  your  affairs  1 
But  if  you  need  a  friend — a  sister " 

"  I  don't  need  any  sister.  I  want  you  should  let 
me  alone." 

At  these  words,  so  little  appreciative  of  her  con 
descension,  her  romantic  beneficence,  her  unselfish 
interest,  Sibyl  suddenly  rebounded  to  her  former 
level,  which  she  was  sensible  was  far  above  that  of 
this  unworthy  object  of  her  kindness.  She  rose 
from  her  chair,  and  pursued — 

"  If  you  need  a  friend — a  sister — I  'm  sure  that 
you  can  safely  confide  in — the  cook."  She  looked 
at  him  a  moment,  and  broke  into  a  malicious  laugh 
very  unlike  that  of  a  social  reformer,  which  rang 
shriller  at  the  bovine  fury  which  mounted  to  Lemuel's 
eyes.  The  rattle  of  a  night-latch  made  itself  heard 
in  the  outer  door.  Sibyl's  voice  began  to  break,  as 
it  rose  :  "I  never  expected  to  be  treated  in  my  own 
aunt's  house  with  such  perfect  ingratitude  and  impu 
dence — yes,  impudence  ! — by  one  of  her  servants  ! " 

She  swept  out  of  the  room,  and  her  aunt,  who 
entered  it,  after  calling  to  her  in  vain,  stood  with 
Lemuel,  and  heard  her  mount  the  stairs,  sobbing,  to 
her  own  room,  and  lock  herself  in. 

"  What  is  the  matter,  Lemuel  ? "  asked  Miss 
Yane,  breathing  quickly.  She  looked  at  him  with 
the  air  of  a  judge  who  would  not  condemn  him 


176  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

unheard,  but  would  certainly  do  so  after  hearing 
him.  Whether  it  was  Lemuel's  perception  of  this 
that  kept  him  silent,  or  his  confusion  of  spirit  from 
all  the  late  rapidly  successive  events,  or  a  wish  not 
to  inculpate  the  girl  who  had  insulted  him,  he  re 
mained  silent. 

"  Answer  me  !  "  said  Miss  Vane  sharply. 

Lemuel  cleared  his  throat.  "I  don't  know  as 
I  've  got  anything  to  say,"  he  answered  finally. 

"But  I  insist  upon  your  saying  something,"  said 
Miss  Vane.  "  What  is  this  impudence  ?  " 

"There  hasn't  been  any  impudence,"  replied 
Lemuel,  hanging  his  head. 

"Very  well,  then,  you  can  tell  me  what  Sibyl 
means,"  persisted  Miss  Vane. 

Lemuel  seemed  to  reflect  upon  it.  "  No,  I  can't 
tell  you,"  he  said  at  last,  slowly  and  gently. 

"  You  refuse  to  make  any  explanation  whatever  1 " 

"Yes." 

Miss  Vane  rose  from  the  chair  which  she  had 
mechanically  sunk  into  while  waiting  for  him  to 
speak,  and  ceased  to  be  the  kindly,  generous  soul 
she  was,  in  asserting  herself  as  a  gentlewoman  who 
had  a  contumacious  servant  to  treat  with.  "  You 
will  wait  here  a  moment,  please." 

"All  right,"  said  Lemuel.  She  had  asked  him 
not  to  receive  instructions  from  her  with  that  par 
ticular  answer,  but  he  could  not  always  remember. 

She  went  upstairs,  and  returned  with  some  bank 
notes  that  rustled  in  her  trembling  hand.  "It  is 
two  months  since  you  came,  and  I  Ve  paid  you  one 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     177 

month,"  she  said,  and  she  set  her  lips,  and  tried  to 
govern  her  head,  which  nevertheless  shook  with  the 
vehemence  she  was  struggling  to  repress.  She  laid 
two  ten-dollar  notes  upon  the  table,  and  then  added 
a  five,  a  little  apart.  "  This  second  month  was  to 
be  twenty  instead  of  ten.  I  shall  not  want  you  any 
longer,  and  should  be  glad  to  have  you  go  now — at 
once — to-night !  But  I  had  intended  to  offer  you  a 
little  present  at  Christmas,  and  I  will  give  it  you 
now." 

Lemuel  took  up  the  two  ten-dollar  notes  without 
saying  anything,  and  then  after  a  moment  laid  one  of 
them  down.  "  It 's  only  half  a  month,"  he  said.  "  I 
don't  want  to  be  paid  for  any  more  than  I  Ve  done." 

"  Lemuel !  "  cried  Miss  Yane.  "  I  insist  upon 
your  taking  it.  I  employed  you  by  the  month." 

"  It  don't  make  any  difference  about  that ;  I  Ve 
only  been  here  a  month  and  a  half." 

He  folded  the  notes,  and  turned  to  go  out  of  the 
room.  Miss  Yane  caught  the  five-dollar  note  from 
the  table  and  intercepted  him  with  it.  "  Well,  then, 
you  shall  take  it  as  a  present." 

"I  don't  want  any  present,"  said  Lemuel,  patiently 
waiting  her  pleasure  to  release  him,  but  keeping  his 
hands  in  his  pockets. 

'You  would  have  taken  it  at  Christmas,"  said 
Miss  Yane.  "  You  shall  take  it  now." 

"I  shouldn't  take  a  present  any  time,"  returned 
Lemuel  steadily. 

"  You  are  a  foolish  boy  ! "  cried  Miss  Yane.     "  You 
need  it,  and  I  tell  you  to  take  it." 
1C 


178  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  j   OR, 

He  made  no  reply  whatever. 

"You  are  behaving  very  stubbornly — ungrate 
fully,"  said  Miss  Vane. 

Lemuel  lifted  his  head ;  his  lip  quivered  a  little. 
"  I  don't  think  you  ;ve  got  any  right  to  say  I  'm 
ungrateful. " 

"I  don't  mean  ungrateful,"  said  Miss  Vane.  "I 
mean  unkind — very  silly,  indeed.  And  I  wish  you 
to  take  this  money.  You  are  behaving  resentfully 
— wickedly.  I  am  much  older  than  you,  and  I  tell 
you  that  you  are  not  behaving  rightly.  Why  don't 
you  do  what  I  wish  1 " 

"  I  don't  want  any  money  I  haven't  earned." 

"  I  don't  mean  the  money.  Why  don't  you  tell 
me  the  meaning  of  what  I  heard  ?  My  niece  said 
you  had  been  impudent  to  her.  Perhaps  she  didn't 
understand." 

She  looked  wistfully  into  the  boy's  face. 

After  a  long  time  he  said,  "  I  don't  know  as  I  've 
got  anything  to  say  about  it." 

"  Very  well,  then,  you  may  go"  said  Miss  Vane, 
with  all  her  hauteur. 

"  Well,  good  evening,"  said  Lemuel  passively,  but 
the  eyes  that  he  looked  at  her  with  were  moist,  and 
conveyed  a  pathetic  reproach.  To  her  unmeasured 
astonishment,  he  offered  her  his  hand;  her  amaze 
was  even  greater — more  infinite,  as  she  afterwards 
told  Sewell — when  she  found  herself  shaking  it. 

He  went  out  of  the  room,  and  she  heard  him 
walking  about  his  room  in  the  L,  putting  together 
his  few  belongings.  Then  she  heard  him  go  down 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  179 

and  open  the  furnace  door,  and  she  knew  he  was 
giving  a  final  conscientious  look  at  the  fire.  He 
closed  it,  and  she  heard  him  close  the  basement  door 
behind  him,  and  knew  that  he  was  gone. 

She  explored  the  L,  and  then  she  descended  to 
the  basement  and  mechanically  looked  it  over. 
Everything  that  could  be  counted  hers  by  the  most 
fastidious  sense  of  property  had  been  left  behind 
him  in  the  utmost  neatness.  On  their  accustomed 
nail,  just  inside  the  furnace-room,  hung  the  blue 
overalls.  They  looked  like  a  suicidal  Lemuel  hang 
ing  there. 

Miss  Vane  went  upstairs  slowly,  with  a  heavy 
heart.  Under  the  hall  light  stood  Sibyl,  picturesque 
in  the  deep  shadow  it  flung  upon  her  face. 

"  Aunt  Hope,"  she  began  in  a  tragic  voice. 

"  Don't  speak  to  me,  you  wicked  girl !  "  cried  her 
aunt,  venting  her  self-reproach  upon  this  victim. 
"It  is  your  doing." 

Sibyl  turned  with  the  meekness  of  an  ostentatious 
scape-goat,  unjustly  bearing  the  sins  of  her  tribe, 
and  went  upstairs  into  the  wilderness  of  her  own 
thoughts  again. 


XIII. 

THE  sense  of  outrage  with  which  Lemuel  was 
boiling  when  Miss  Vane  came  in  upon  Sibyl  and 
himself  had  wholly  passed  away,  and  he  now  saw 
his  dismissal,  unjust  as  between  that  girl  and  him, 
unimpeachably  righteous  as  between  him  and  the 
moral  frame  of  things.  If  he  had  been  punished  for 
being  ready  to  take  advantage  of  that  fellow's 
necessity,  and  charge  him  fifty  cents  for  changing 
ten  dollars,  he  must  now  be  no  less  obviously 
suffering  for  having  abused  that  young  lady's  trust 
and  defencelessness ;  only  he  was  not  suffering  one- 
tenth  as  much.  When  he  recurred  to  that  wrong, 
in  fact,  and  tried  to  feel  sorry  for  it  and  ashamed, 
his  heart  thrilled  in  a  curious  way  ;  he  found  himself 
smiling  and  exulting,  and  Miss  Yane  and  her  niece 
went  out  of  his  mind,  and  he  could  not  think  of  any 
thing  but  of  being  with  that  girl,  of  hearing  her  talk 
and  laugh,  of  touching  her.  He  sighed ;  he  did  not 
know  what  his  mother  would  say  if  she  knew ;  he 
did  not  know  where  he  was  going;  it  seemed  a 
hundred  years  since  the  beginning  of  the  afternoon. 

A  horse-car  came  by,  and  Lemuel  stopped  it.     He 

180 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     181 

set  his  bag  down  on  the  platform,  and  stood  there 
near  the  conductor,  without  trying  to  go  inside,  for 
the  bag  was  pretty  large,  and  he  did  not  believe  the 
conductor  would  let  him  take  it  in. 

The  conductor  said  politely  after  a  while,  "See, 
'd  I  get  your  fare  1 " 

"  No,"  said  Lemuel.  He  paid,  and  the  conductor 
went  inside  and  collected  the  other  fares. 

When  he  came  back  he  took  advantage  of  Lemuel's 
continued  presence  to  have  a  little  chat.  He  was  a 
short,  plump,  stubby-moustached  man,  and  he  looked 
strong  and  well,  but  he  said,  with  an  introductory 
sigh,  "  Well,  sir,  I  get  sore  all  over  at  this  business. 
There  ain't  a  bone  in  me  that  hain't  got  an  ache  in 
it.  Sometimes  I  can't  tell  but  what  it 's  the  ache  got 
a  bone  in  it,  ache  seems  the  biggest." 

"  Why,  what  makes  it  ? "  asked  Lemuel  absently. 

11  Oh,  it  's  this  standin' ;  it  's  the  hours,  and 
changin'  the  hours* so  much.  You  hain't  got  a 
chance  to  get  used  to  one  set  o'  hours  before  they 
get  'em  all  shifted  round  again.  Last  week  I  was 
on  from  eight  to  eight ;  this  week  it 's  from  twelve 
to  twelve.  Lord  knows  what  it 's  going  to  be  next 
week.  And  this  is  one  o'  the  best  lines  in  town,- 
too." 

"I  presume  they  pay  you  pretty  well,"  said 
Lemuel,  with  awakening  interest. 

"  Well,  they  pay  a  dollar  'n'  half  a  day,"  said  the 
conductor. 

"  Why,  it 's  more  than  forty  dollars  a  month,"  said 
Lemuel. 


182  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

"Well,  it  is,"  said  the  conductor  scornfully,  "if 
you  work  every  day  in  the  Aveek.  But  I  can't  stand  it 
more  than  six  days  out  o'  seven;  and  if  you  miss  a  day, 
or  if  you  miss  a  trip,  they  dock  you.  No,  sir.  It 's 
about  the  meanest  business  /  ever  struck.  If  I 
'wa'n't  a  married  man,  'n'  if  I  didn't  like  to  be 
regular  about  my  meals  and  get  'em  at  home  'th  my 
wife,  I  wouldn't  stand  it  a  minute.  But  that's 
where  it  is.  It's  regular." 

A  lady  from  within  signalled  the  conductor.  He 
stopped  the  car,  and  the  lady,  who  had  risen  with 
her  escort,  remained  chatting  with  a  friend  before 
she  got  out.  The  conductor  snapped  his  bell  for 
starting,  with  a  look  of  patient  sarcasm.  "See 
that  1 "  he  asked  Lemuel.  "  Some  these  women  act 
as  if  the  cars  was  their  private  carriage ;  and  you  got 
to  act  so  too,  or  the  lady  complains  of  you,  and  the 
company  bounces  you  in  a  minute.  Stock 's  owned 
along  the  line,  and  they  thinl^  they  own  you  too. 
You  can't  get  'em  to  set  more  than  ten  on  a 
side ;  they  '11  leave  the  car  first.  I  'd  like  to  catch 
'em  on  some  the  South  End  or  Cambridge  cars. 
I  'd  show  'em  how  to  pack  live  stock  once,  anyway. 
Yes,  sir,  these  ladies  that  ride  on  this  line  think 
they  can  keep  the  car  standin'  while  they  talk  about 
the  opera.  But  you'd  ought  to  see  how  they  all 
look  if  a  poor  woman  tries  their  little  game.  Oh,  I 
tell  you,  rich  people  are  hard." 

Lemuel  reflected  upon  the  generalisation.  He 
regarded  Miss  Vane  as  a  rich  person;  but  though 
she  had  blamed  him  unjustly,  and  had  used  him 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     183 

impatiently,  even  cruelly,  in  this  last  affair,  he 
remembered  other  things,  and  he  said — 

"  Well,  I  don't  know  as  I  should  say  all  of  them 
were  hard." 

"Well,  may  be  not,"  admitted  the  conductor. 
"  But  I  don't  envy  'em.  The  way  I  look  at  it,  and 
the  way  I  tell  my  wife,  I  wouldn't  want  their  money 
'f  I  had  to  have  the  rest  of  it.  Ain't  any  of  'em 
happy.  I  saw  that  when  I  lived  out.  No,  sir ; 
what  me  and  my  wife  want  to  do  is  to  find  us  a  nice 
little  place  in  the  country." 

At  the  words  a  vision  of  Willoughby  Pastures 
rose  upon  Lemuel,  and  a  lump  of  home-sickness  came 
into  his  throat.  He  saw  the  old  wood-coloured 
house,  crouching  black  within  its  walls  under  the 
cold  November  stars.  If  his  mother  had  not  gone 
to  bed  yet,  she  was  sitting  beside  the  cooking-stove 
in  the  kitchen,  and  perhaps  his  sister  was  brewing 
something  on  it,  potion  or  lotion,  for  her  husband's 
rheumatism.  Miss  Vane  had  talked  to  him  about 
his  mother ;  she  had  said  he  might  have  her  down 
to  visit  him,  if  everything  went  on  right ;  but  of 
course  he  knew  that  Miss  Yane  did  not  understand 
that  his  mother  wore  bloomers,  and  he  made  up  his 
mind  that  her  invitation  was  never  to  be  accepted.  At 
the  same  time  he  had  determined  to  ask  Miss  Vane 
to  let  him  go  up  and  see  his  mother  some  Sunday. 

"  'S  fur 's  we  go,"  said  the  conductor.  "  'F  you  're 
goin'  on,  you  want  to  take  another  car  here." 

"  I  guess  I  '11  go  back  with  you  a  little  ways,"  said 
Lemuel.  "  I  want  to  ask  you " 


184  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

"Guess  we'll  have  to  take  a  back  seat,  then," 
said  the  conductor,  leading  the  way  through  the  car 
to  the  other  platform;  "or  a  standee,"  he  added, 
snapping  the  bell.  "  What  is  it  you  want  to  ask  ?  " 

"  Oh,  nothing.  How  do  you  fellows  learn  to  be 
conductors  1  How  long  does  it  take  you  1 " 

Till  other  passengers  should  come  the  conductor 
lounged  against  the  guard  of  the  platform  in  a 
conversational  posture. 

"  Well,  generally  it  takes  you  four  or  five  days. 
You  got  to  learn  all  the  cross  streets,  and  the 
principal  places  on  all  the  lines." 

"Yes?" 

"  It  didn't  take  me  more  'n  two.     Boston  boy." 

"  Yes,"  said  Lemuel,  with  a  fine  discouragement. 
"I  presume  the  conductors  are  mostly  from  Boston." 

"  They  're  from  everywhere.  And  some  of  'em 
are  pretty  streaked,  I  can  tell  you;  and  then  the 
rest  of  us  has  got  to  suffer ;  throws  suspicion  on  all 
of  us.  One  fellow  gets  to  stealin'  fares,  and  then 
everybody  's  got  to  wear  a  bell-punch.  I  never  hear 
mine  go  without  thinkin'  it  says,  '  Stop  thief ! ' 
Makes  me  sick,  I  can  tell  you.' 

After  a  while  Lemuel  asked,  "  How  do  you  get 
such  a  position  1 " 

The  conductor  seemed  to  be  thinking  about  some 
thing  else.  "It's  a  pretty  queer  kind  of  a  world, 
anyway,  the  way  everybody  's  mixed  up  with  every 
body  else.  What 's  the  reason,  if  a  man  wants  to 
steal,  he  can't  steal  and  suffer  for  it  himself,  without 
throwin1  the  shame  and  the  blame  on  a  lot  more 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     185 

people  that  never  thought  o'  stealin'  1  I  don't  notice 
much  when  a  fellow  sets  out  to  do  right  that  folks 
think  everybody  else  is  on  the  square.  No,  sir, 
they  don't  seem  to  consider  that  kind  of  complaint 
so  catching.  Now,  you  take  another  thing :  A 
woman  goes  round  with  the  scarlet  fever  in  her 
clothes,  and  a  whole  earful  of  people  take  it  home 
to  their  children ;  but  let  a  nice  young  girl  get  in, 
fresh  as  an  apple,  and  a  perfect  daisy  for  wholesome- 
ness  every  way,  and  she  don't  give  it  to  a  single 
soul  on  board.  No,  sir ;  it 's  a  world  I  can't  see 
through,  nor  begin  to." 

"I  never  thought  of  it  that  way,"  said  Lemuel, 
darkened  by  this  black  pessimism  of  the  conductor. 
He  had  not,  practically,  found  the  world  so  unjust 
as  the  conductor  implied,  but  he  could  not  con 
trovert  his  argument.  He  only  said,  "  May  be  the 
right  thing  makes  us  feel  good  in  some  way  we  don't 
know  of." 

"Well,  I  don't  want  to  feel  good  in  some  way  I 
don't  know  of,  myself,"  said  the  conductor  very 
scornfully. 

"No,  that's  so,"  Lemuel  admitted.  He  remained 
silent,  with  a  vague  wonder  flitting  through  his 
mind  whether  Mr.  Sewell  could  make  anything 
better  of  the  case,  and  then  settled  back  to  his 
thoughts  of  Statira,  pierced  and  confused  as  they 
were  now  with  his  pain  from  that  trouble  with  Miss 
Vane. 

"What  was  that  you  asked  me  just  now?"  said 
the  conductor. 


186  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"  That  I  asked  you  1 "  Lemuel  echoed.  "  Oh  yes  ! 
I  asked  you  how  you  got  your  place  on  the  cars." 

"  Well,  sir,  you  have  to  have  recommendations — 
they  won't  touch  you  without  'em;  and  then  you 
have  to  have  about  seventy-five  dollars  capital  to 
start  with.  You  got  to  get  your  coat,  and  your  cap, 
and  your  badge,  and  you  got  to  have  about  twenty 
dollars  of  your  own  to  make  change  with,  first  off ; 
company  don't  start  you  with  a  cent." 

Lemuel  made  no  reply.  After  a  while  he  asked, 
"  Do  you  know  any  good  hotel,  around  here,  where 
I  could  go  for  the  night  ?  " 

"  Well,  there  's  the  Brunswick,  and  there  '&  the 
Van-dome,"  said  the  conductor.  "  They  're  both 
pretty  fair  houses."  Lemuel  looked  round  at  the 
mention  of  the  aristocratic  hostelries  to  see  if  the 
conductor  was  joking.  He  owned  to  something 
of  the  kind  by  adding,  " There's  a  little  hotel,  if  you 
want  something  quieter,  that  ain't  a  great  ways 
from  here."  He  gave  the  name  of  the  hotel,  and 
told  Lemuel  how  to  find  it. 

"Thank  you,"  said  Lemuel.  "I  guess  I'll  get 
off  here,  then.  Well,  good  evening." 

"  Guess  I  '11  have  to  get  another  nickel  from  you," 
said  the  conductor,  snapping  his  bell.  "  New  trip," 
he  explained. 

"  Oh,"  said  Lemuel,  paying.  It  seemed  to  him  a 
short  ride  for  five  cents. 

He  got  off,  and  as  the  conductor  started  up  the 
car,  he  called  forward  through  it  to  the  driver, 
"  Wanted  to  try  for  conductor,  I  guess.  But  I  guess 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     187 

the   seventy-five   dollars  capital   settled   that   little 
point  for  him." 

Lemuel  heard  the  voice  but  not  the  words.  He 
felt  his  bag  heavy  in  his  hand  as  he  walked  away  in 
the  direction  the  conductor  had  given  him,  and  he 
did  not  set  it  down  when  he  stood  hesitating  in 
front  of  the  hotel;  it  looked  like  too  expensive  a 
place  for  him,  with  its  stained-glass  door,  and  its 
bulk  hoisted  high  into  the  air.  He  walked  by  the 
hotel,  and  then  he  came  back  to  it,  and  mustered 
courage  to  go  in.  His  bag,  if  not  superb,  looked  a 
great  deal  more  like  baggage  than  the  lank  sack 
which  he  had  come  to  Boston  with ;  he  had  bought 
it  only  a  few  days  before,  in  hopes  of  going  home 
before  long ;  he  set  it  down  with  some  confidence  on 
the  tesselated  floor  of  cheap  marble,  and  when  a 
shirt-sleeved,  drowsy-eyed,  young  man  came  out  of  a 
little  room  or  booth  near  the  door,  where  there  was 
a  desk,  and  a  row  of  bells,  and  a  board  with  keys, 
hanging  from  the  wall  above  it,  Lemuel  said  quite 
boldly  that  he  would  like  a  room.  The  man  said, 
well,  they  did  not  much  expect  transients ;  it  was 
more  of  a  family-hotel,  like ;  but  he  guessed  they 
had  a  vacancy,  and  they  could  put  him  up.  He 
brushed  his  shirt  sleeves  down  with  his  hands,  and 
looked  apologetically  at  some  ashes  on  his  trousers, 
and  said,  well,  it  was  not  much  use  trying  to  put  on 
style,  anyway,  when  you  were  taking  care  of  a  furnace 
and  had  to  run  the  elevator  yourself,  and  look  after 
the  whole  concern.  He  said  his  aunt  mostly  looked 
after  letting  the  rooms,  but  she  was  at  church,  and 


188  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

he  guessed  he  should  have  to  see  about  it  himself. 
He  bade  Lemuel  just  get  right  into  the  elevator,  and 
he  put  his  bag  into  a  cage  that  hung  in  one  corner 
of  the  hallway,  and  pulled  at  the  wire  rope,  and 
they  mounted  together.  On  the  way  up  he  had 
time  to  explain  that  the  clerk,  who  usually  ran  the 
elevator  when  they  had  no  elevator-boy,  had  kicked, 
and  they  were  just  between  hay  and  grass,  as  you 
might  say.  He  showed  Lemuel  into  a  grandiose 
parlour  or  drawing-room,  enormously  draped  and 
upholstered,  and  furnished  in  a  composite  applica 
tion  of  yellow  jute  and  red  plush  to  the  ashen  easy- 
chairs  and  sofa.  A  folding-bed  in  the  figure  of  a 
chiffonier  attempted  to  occupy  the  whole  side  of  the 
wall  and  failed. 

"  I  'm  afraid  it 's  more  than  I  can  pay,"  said 
Lemuel.  "  I  guess  I  better  see  some  other  room." 
But  the  man  said  the  room  belonged  to  a  boarder 
that  had  just  gone,  and  he  guessed  they  would  not 
charge  him  very  much  for  it ;  he  guessed  Lemuel 
had  better  stay.  He  pulled  the  bed  down,  and 
showed  him  how  it  worked,  and  he  lighted  two 
bulbous  gas-burners,  contrived  to  burn  the  gas  at 
such  a  low  pressure  that  they  were  like  two  unsnuffed 
candles  for  brilliancy.  He  backed  round  over  the 
spacious  floor  and  looked  about  him  with  an  unfami 
liar,  marauding  air,  which  had  a  certain  boldness,  but 
failed  to  impart  courage  to  Lemuel,  who  trembled 
for  fear  of  the  unknown  expense.  But  he  was 
ashamed  to  go  away,  and  when  the  man  left  him  he 
went  to  bed,  after  some  suspicious  investigation  of 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     189 

the  machine  he  was  -to  sleep  in.  He  found  its 
comfort  unmistakable.  He  was  tired  out  with  what 
had  been  happening,  and  the  events  of  the  day 
recurred  in  a  turmoil  that  helped  rather  than 
hindered  slumber ;  none  evolved  itself  distinctly 
enough  from  the  mass  to  pursue  him ;  what  he  was 
mainly  aware  of  was  the  daring  question  whether 
he  could  not  get  the  place  of  that  clerk  who  had 
kicked. 

In  the  morning  he  saw  the  landlady,  who  was 
called  Mrs.  Harmon,  and  who  took  the  pay  for  his 
lodging,  and  said  he  might  leave  his  bag  a  while  there 
in  the  office.  She  was  a  large,  smooth,  tranquil  person, 
who  seemed  ready  for  any  sort  of  consent ;  she  entered 
into  an  easy  conversation  with  Lemuel,  and  was  so 
sympathetic  in  regard  to  the  difficulties  of  getting 
along  in  the  city,  that  he  had  proposed  himself  as 
clerk  and  been  accepted  almost  before  he  believed  the 
thing  had  happened.  He  was  getting  a  little  used 
to  the  rapidity  of  urban  transactions,  but  his  mind 
had  still  a  rustic  difficulty  in  keeping  up  with  his 
experiences. 

"  I  suppose,"  said  Mrs.  Harmon,  "it  ain't  very  usual 
to  take  anybody  without  a  reference  ;  I  never  do  it ; 
but  so  long  as  you  haven't  been  a  great  while  in  the 
city You  ever  had  a  place  in  Boston  before  1 " 

"  Well,  not  exactly  what  you  may  call  a  place," 
said  Lemuel,  with  a  conscience  against  describing  in 
that  way  his  position  at  Miss  Vane's.  "  It  was  only 
part  work."  He  added,  "  I  wasn't  there  but  a  little 
while." 


190  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

"  Know  anybody  in  the  city  1 " 

"Yes,"  said  Lemuel  reluctantly;  "I  know  Eev. 
David  L.  Sewell,  some." 

"Oh,  all  right,"  said  Mrs.  Harmon,  with  eager 
satisfaction.  "  I  have  to  be  pretty  particular  who  I 
have  in  the  house.  The  boarders  are  all  high-class, 
and  I  have  to  have  all  the  departments  accordingly. 
I'll  see  Mr.  Sewell  about  you  as  soon  as  I  get  time,  and 
I  guess  you  can  take  right  hold  now,  if  you  want  to." 

Mrs.  Harmon  showed  him  in  half  a  minute  how 
to  manage  the  elevator,  and  then  left  him  with  general 
instructions  to  tell  everybody  who  came  upon  any 
errand  he  did  not  understand,  that  she  would  be  back 
in  a  very  short  time.  He  found  pen  and  paper  in  the 
office,  and  she  said  he  might  write  the  letter  that  he 
asked  leave  to  send  his  mother ;  when  he  mentioned 
his  mother,  she  said,  yes,  indeed,  with  a  burst  of  ma 
ternal  sympathy  which  was  imagined  in  her  case,  for 
she  had  already  told  Lemuel  that  if  she  had  ever  had 
any  children  she  would  not  have  gone  into  the  hotel 
business,  which  she  believed  unfriendly  to  their  right 
nurture  ;  she  said  she  never  liked  to  take  ladies  with 
children. 

He  enclosed  some  money  to  his  mother  which  he 
head  intended  to  send,  but  which,  before  the  occur 
rence  of  the  good  fortune  that  now  seemed  opening 
upon  him,  he  thought  he  must  withhold.  He  made 
as  little  as  he  could  of  his  parting  with  Miss  Vane, 
whom  he  had  celebrated  in  earlier  letters  to  his 
mother ;  he  did  not  wish  to  afflict  her  on  his  own 
account,  or  incense  her  against  Miss  Vane,  who,  he 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     191 

felt,  could  not  help  her  part  in  it ;  but  his  heart 
burned  anew  against  Miss  Sibyl  while  he  wrote.  He 
dwelt  upon  his  good  luck  in  getting  this  new  position 
at  once,  and  he  let  his  mother  see  that  he  considered 
it  a  rise  in  life.  He  said  he  was  going  to  try  to  get 
Mrs.  Harmon  to  let  him  go  home  for  Thanksgiving, 
though  he  presumed  he  might  have  to  come  back  the 
same  night. 

His  letter  was  short,  but  he  was  several  times 
interrupted  by  the  lady  boarders,  many  of  whom 
stopped  to  ask  Mrs.  Harmon  something  on  their  way 
to  their  rooms  from  breakfast.  They  did  not  really 
want  anything,  in  most  cases ;  but  they  were  strict 
with  Lemuel  in  Avantirig  to  know  just  when  they 
could  see  Mrs.  Harmon ;  and  they  delayed  somewhat 
to  satisfy  a  natural  curiosity  in  regard  to  him.  They 
made  talk  with  him  as  he  took  them  up  in  the  eleva 
tor,  and  did  what  they  could  to  find  out  about  him. 
Most  of  them  had  their  door-keys  in  their  hands, 
and  dangled  them  by  the  triangular  pieces  of  brass 
which  the  keys  were  chained  to ;  they  affected  some 
sort  of  negligee  breakfast  costume,  and  Lemuel  thought 
them  very  fashionable.  They  nearly  all  snuffled  and 
whined  as  they  spoke ;  some  had  a  soft,  lazy  nasal ; 
others  broke  abruptly  from  silence  to  silence,  in 
voices  of  nervous  sharpness,  like  the  cry  or  the  bleat 
of  an  animal ;  one  young  girl,  who  was  quite  pretty, 
had  a  high,  hoarse  voice,  like  a  gander. 

Lemuel  did  not  mind  all  this  ;  he  talked  through 
his  nose  too ;  and  he  accepted  Mrs.  Harmon's  smooth 
characterisation  of  her  guests,  as  she  called  them, 


192  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  j   OR, 

which  she  delivered  in  a  slow,  unimpassioned  voice. 
"  I  never  have  any  but  the  highest  class  people  in 
my  house — the  very  nicest ;  and  I  never  have  any 
jangling  going  on.  In  the  first  place  I  never  allow 
anybody  to  have  anything  to  complain  of,  and  then 
if  they  do  complain,  I  'm  right  up  and  down  with 
them ;  I  tell  them  their  rooms  are  wanted,  and  they 
understand  what  I  mean.  And  I  never  allow  any 
trouble  among  the  servants  ;  I  tell  them,  if  they  are 
not  suited,  that  I  don't  want  them  to  stay ;  and  if 
they  get  to  quarrelling  among  themselves,  I  send  them 
all  away,  and  get  a  new  lot ;  I  pay  the  highest  wages, 
and  I  can  always  do  it.  If  you  want  to  keep  up 
with  the  times  at  all,  you  have  got  to  set  a  good 
table,  and  I  mean  to  set  just  as  good  a  table  as  any 
in  Boston ;  I  don't  intend  to  let  any  one  complain  of 
my  house  on  that  score.  Well,  it 's  as  broad  as  it 's 
long  :  if  you  set  a  good  table,  you  can  ask  a  good 
price  ;  and  if  you  don't,  you  can't,  that 's  all.  Pay  as 
you  go,  is  my  motto." 

Mrs.  Harmon  sat  talking  in  the  little  den  beside 
the  door  which  she  called  the  office,  when  she  returned 
from  that  absence  which  she  had  asked  him  to  say 
would  not  be  more  than  fifteen  minutes  at  the  out 
side.  It  had  been  something  more  than  two  hours, 
and  it  had  ended  almost  clandestinely  ;  but  knowledge 
of  her  return  had  somehow  spread  through  the  house, 
and  several  ladies  came  in  while  she  was  talking,  to 
ask  when  their  window-shades  were  to  be  put  up,  or 
to  say  that  they  knew  their  gas-fixtures  must  be 
out  of  order ;  or  that  there  were  mice  in  their  closets, 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     193 

for  they  had  heard  them  gnawing ;  or  that  they  were 
sure  their  set-bowls  smelt,  and  that  the  traps  were 
not  working.  Mrs.  Harmon  was  prompt  in  every 
exigency.  She  showed  the  greatest  surprise  that 
those  shades  had  not  gone  up  yet ;  she  said  she  was 
going  to  send  round  for  the  gasfitter  to  look  at  the 
fixtures  all  over  the  house  ;  and  that  she  would  get 
some  potash  to  pour  down  the  bowls,  for  she  knew 
the  drainage  was  perfect — it  was  just  the  pipes  down 
to  the  traps  that  smelt;  she  advised  a  cat  for  the 
mice,  and  said  she  would  get  one.  She  used  the 
greatest  sympathy  with  the  ladies,  recognising  a  real 
sufferer  in  each,  and  not  attempting  to  deny  anything. 
From  the  dining-room  came  at  times  the  sound  of 
voices,  which  blended  in  a  discord  loud  above  the 
clatter  of  crockery,  but  Mrs.  Harmon  seemed  not  to 
hear  them.  An  excited  foreigner  of  some  sort  finally 
rushed  from  this  quarter,  and  thrust  his  head  into 
the  booth  where  Lemuel  and  Mrs.  Harmon  sat,  long 
enough  to  explode  some  formula  of  renunciation 
upon  her,  which  left  her  serenity  unruffled.  She 
received  with  the  same  patience  the  sarcasm  of  a 
boarder  who  appeared  at  the  office-door  with  a  bag 
in  his  hand,  and  said  he  would  send  an  express-man 
for  his  trunk.  He  threw  down  the  money  for  his 
receipted  bill ;  and  when  she  said  she  was  sorry  he 
was  going,  he  replied  that  he  could  not  stand  the 
table  any  longer,  and  that  he  believed  that  French 
cook  of  hers  had  died  on  the  way  over;  he  was 
tired  of  the  Nova  Scotia  temporary,  who  had  become 
permanent. 

N 


194  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

A  gentleman  waited  for  [the  parting  guest  to  be 
gone,  and  then  said  to  the  tranquil  Mrs.  Harmon : 
"  So  Mellen  has  kicked,  has  he  ?  " 

"Yes,  Mr.  Evans,"  said  Mrs.  Harmon;  "  Mr. 
Mellen  has  kicked." 

"  And  don't  you  Tvant  to  abuse  him  a  little  ?  You 
can  to  me,  you  know,"  suggested  the  gentleman. 

He  had  a  full  beard,  parted  at  the  chin ;  it  was 
almost  white,  and  looked  older  than  the  rest  of  his 
face;  his  eyes  were  at  once  sad  and  whimsical. 
Lemuel  tried  to  think  where  lie  had  seen  him  before. 

"Thank  you;  I  don't  know  as  it  would  do  any 
good,  Mr.  Evans.  But  if  he  could  have  waited  one 
week  longer,  I  should  have  bad  that  cook." 

"  Yes,  that  is  what  I  firmly  believe.  Do  you  feel 
too  much  broken  up  to  accept  a  ticket  to  the  Wednes 
day  matinee  at  the  Museum  1 " 

"  No,  I  don't,"  said  Mrs.  Harmon.    "  But  I  shouldn't 
want  to  deprive  Mrs.  Evans  of  it." 

"  Oh,  she  wouldn't  go,"  said  Mr.  Evans,  with  a 
slight  sigh.  "  You  had  better  take  it.  Jefferson's 
going  to  do  Bob  Acres" 

"  Is  that  so  ?  "  asked  Mrs.  Harmon  placidly,  taking 
the  ticket.  "  Well,  I  'in  ever  so  much  obliged  to 
you,  Mr.  Evans.  Mr.  Evans,  Mr.  Barker — our  new 
clerk,"  she  said,  introducing  them. 

Lemuel  rose  with  rustic  awkwardness,  and  shook 
hands  with  Mr.  Evans,  who  looked  at  him  with  a 
friendly  smile,  but  said  nothing. 

"  Now  Mr.  Barker  is  here,  I  guess  I  can  get  the 
time."  Mr.  Evans  said,  well,  he  was  glad  she  could, 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     195 

and  went  out  of  the  street  door.  "  He 's  just  one  of 
the  nicest  gentlemen  I  }ve  got,"  continued  Mrs.  Har 
mon,  following  him  with  her  eye  as  far  as  she 
conveniently  could  without  turning  her  head,  "  him 
and  his  wife  both.  Ever  heard  of  the  Saturday 
Afternoon  ?  " 

"I  don't  know  as  I  have,"  said  Lemuel. 

"  Well,  he 's  one  of  the  editors.  It 's  a  kind  of  a 
Sunday  paper,  I  guess,  for  all  it  don't  come  out  that 
day.  I  presume  he  could  go  every  night  in  the  week 
to  every  theatre  in  town,  if  he  wanted  to.  I  don't 
know  how  many  tickets  he  's  give  me.  Some  of  the 
ladies  seem  to  think  he 's  always  makin'  fun  of  them  ; 
but  I  can't  ever  feel  that  way.  He  used  to  board 
with  a  great  friend  of  mine,  him  and  his  wife. 
They  've  been  with  me  now  ever  since  Mrs.  Hewitt 
died ;  she  was  the  one  they  boarded  with  before. 
They  say  he  used  to  be  dreadful  easy-going,  'n'  't 
his  wife  was  all 't  saved  him.  But  I  guess  he 's  diffe 
rent  now.  Well,  I  must  go  out  and  see  after  the 
lunch.  You  watch  the  office,  and  say  just  what  I  told 
you  before." 


XIY. 

SEWELL  chanced  to  open  his  door  to  go  out  just  as 
Miss  Vane  put  her  hand  on  the  bell-pull,  the  morning 
after  she  had  dismissed  Lemuel.  The  cheer  of  his 
Monday  face  died  out  at  the  unsmiling  severity  of 
hers ;  but  he  contrived  to  ask  her  in,  and  said  he 
would  call  Mrs.  Sewell,  if  she  would  sit  down  in  the 
reception-room  a  moment. 

"I  don't  know,"  she  said,  with  a  certain  look  of 
inquiry,  not  unmixed  with  compassion.  "It's  about 
Lemuel." 

The  minister  fetched  a  deep  sigh.  "  Yes,  I  know 
it.  But  she  will  have  to  know  it  sooner  or  later." 
He  went  to  the  stairway  and  called  her  name,  and 
then  returned  to  Miss  Yane  in  the  reception-room. 

"  Has  Lemuel  been  here  1 "  she  asked. 

"No." 
x  "  You  said  you  knew  it  was  about  him " 

"  It  was  my  bad  conscience,  I  suppose,  and  your 
face  that  told  me." 

Miss  Yane  waited  for  Mrs.  Sewell's  presence  before 
she  unpacked  her  heart.  Then  she  left  nothing  in  it. 
She  ended  by  saying,  "  I  have  examined  and  cross- 

196 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     197 

examined  Sibyl,  but  it's  like  cross-questioning  a 
chameleon  ;  she  changed  colour  with  every  new  light 
she  was  put  into."  Here  Miss  Yane  had  got  sorrow 
fully  back  to  something  more  of  her  wonted  humour, 
and  laughed. 

"Poor  Sibyl  I"  said  Mrs.  Sewell. 

"  Poor  ? "  retorted  Miss  Vane.  "  Not  at  all !  I 
could  get  nothing  out  of  either  of  them  ;  but  I  feel 
perfectly  sure  that  Lemuel  was  not  to  blame." 

"  It 's  very  possible,"  suggested  Mrs.  Sewell,  "  that 
he  did  say  something  in  his  awkward  way  that  she 
misconstrued  into  impertinence." 

Miss  Vane  did  not  seem  to  believe  this.  "If- 
Lemuel  had  given  me  the  slightest  satisfaction,"  she 
began  in  self-exculpation.  "  But  no,"  she  broke  off. 
"It  had  to  be!"  She  rose.  "I  thought  I  had 
better  come  and  tell  you  at  once,  Mr.  Sewell.  I 
suppose  you  will  want  to  look  him  up,  and  do  some 
thing  more  for  him.  I  wish  if  you  find  him  you 
would  make  him  take  this  note."  She  gave  the 
minister  a  ten-dollar  bill.  "  I  tried  to  do  so,  but  he 
would  not  have  it.  I  don't  know  what  I  shall  do 
without  him  !  He  is  the  best  and  most  faithful 
creature  in  the  world.  Even  in  this  little  time  I  had 
got  to  relying  implicitly  upon  his  sense,  his  judgment, 
his  goodness,  his Well !  good  morning  ! " 

She  ran  out  of  the  door,  and  left  Sewell  confronted 
with  his  wife. 

He  did  not  know  whether  she  had  left  him  to 
hope  or  to  despair,  and  he  waited  for  his  wife  to 
interpret  his  emotion,  but  Mrs.  Sewell  tacitly  refused 


198  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

to  do  this.  After  a  dreary  interval  he  plucked  a 
random  cheerfulness  out  of  space,  and  said  :  "  Well, 
if  Miss  Vane  feels  in  that  way  about  it,  I  don't  see 
why  the  whole  affair  can't  be  arranged  and  Barker 
reinstated." 

"David,"  returned  his  wife,  not  vehemently  at  all, 
"when  you  come  out  with  those  mannish  ideas  I 
don't  know  what  to  do." 

"  Well,  my  dear,"  said  the  minister,  "  I  should  be 
glad  to  come  out  with  some  womanish  ideas  if  I  had 
them.  I  dare  say  they  would  be  better.  But  I  do 
my  poor  best,  under  the  circumstances.  What  is 
the  trouble  with  my  ideas,  except  that  the  sex  is 
wrong  ? " 

"  You  think,  you  men,"  replied  Mrs.  Sewell,  "  that 
a  thing  like  that  can,  be  mended  up  and  smoothed 
over,  and  made  just  the  same  as  ever.  You  think 
that  because  Miss  Vane  is  sorry  she  sent  Barker 
away  and  wants  him  back,  she  can  take  him  back." 

"  I  don't  see  why  she  can't.  I  've  sometimes 
supposed  that  the  very  highest  purpose  of  Chris 
tianity  was  mutual  forgiveness — forbearance  with 
one  another's  errors/' 

"  That 's  all  very  well,"  said  Mrs.  Sewell.  "  But 
you  know  that  whenever  I  have  taken  a  cook  back, 
after  she  had  shown  temper,  it's  been  an  entire 
failure  ;  and  this  is  a  far  worse  case,  because  there  is 
disappointed  good- will  mixed  up  with  it.  I  don't 
suppose  Barker  is  at  all  to  blame.  Whatever  has 
happened,  you  may  be  perfectly  sure  that  it  has  been 
partly  a  bit  of  stage-play  in  Sibyl  and  partly  a 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  199 

mischievous  desire  to  use  her  power  over  him.  I  fore 
saw  that  she  would  soon  be  tired  of  reforming  him. 
But  whatever  it  is,  it's  something  that  you  can't 
repair.  Suppose  Barker  went  back  to  them ;  could 
they  ignore  what 's  happened  I  " 

11  Of  course  not,"  Sewell  admitted. , 

"  Well,  and  should  he  ask  her  pardon,  or  she  his  1" 

"  The  Socratic  method  is  irresistible,"  said  the 
minister  sadly.  "You  have  proved  that  nothing 
can  be  done  for  Barker  with  the  Yanes.  And  now 
the  question  is,  what  can  be  done  for  him  ? " 

"  That 's  something  I  must  leave  to  you,  David," 
said  his  wife  dispiritedly.  She  arose,  and  as  she 
passed  out  of  the  room  she  added,  "  You  will  have  to 
find  him,  in  the  first  place,  and  you  had  better  go 
round  to  the  police  stations  and  the  tramps'  lodging- 
houses  and  begin  looking." 

Sewell  sighed  heavily  under  the  sarcastic  advice, 
but  acted  upon  it,  and  set  forth  upon  the  useless 
quest,  because  he  did  not  know  in  the  least  what  else 
to  do. 

All  that  week  Barker  lay,  a  lurking  discomfort,  in 
his  soul,  though  as  the  days  passed  the  burden  grew 
undeniably  lighter ;  Sewell  had  a  great  many  things 
besides  Barker  to  think  of.  But  when  Sunday  came, 
and  he  rose  in  his  pulpit,  he  could  not  help  casting  a 
glance  of  guilty  fear  toward  Miss  Yane's  pew  and 
drawing  a  long  breath  of  guilty  relief  not  to  see 
Lemuel  in  it.  We  are  so  made,  that  in  the  reaction 
the  minister  was  able  to  throw  himself  into  the 
matter  of  his  discourse  with  uncommon  fervour. 


200  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

It  was  really  very  good  matter,  and  he  felt  tho 
literary  joy  in  it  which  flatters  the  author  even  of  a 
happily  worded  supplication  to  the  Deity.  He  let 
his  eyes,  freed  from  their  bondage  to  Lemuel's 
attentive  face,  roam  at  large  in  liberal  ease  over  his 
whole  congregation ;  and  when,  toward  the  close  of 
his  sermon,  one  visage  began  to  grow  out  upon 
him  from  the  two  or  three  hundred  others,  and 
to  concentrate  in  itself  the  facial  expression  of  all  the 
rest,  and  become  the  only  countenance  there,  it  was 
a  perceptible  moment  before  he  identified  it  as  that 
of  his  inalienable  charge.  Then  he  began  to  preach 
at  it  as  usual,  but  defiantly,  and  with  yet  a  haste  to 
be  through  and  to  get  speech  with  it  that  he  felt 
was  ludicrous,  and  must  appear  unaccountable  to  his 
hearers.  It  seemed  to  him  that  he  could  not  bring 
his  sermon  to  a  close ;  he  ended  it  in  a  cloudy  burst 
of  rhetoric  which  he  feared  would  please  the  nervous, 
elderly  ladies — who  sometimes  blamed  him  for  a 
want  of  emotionality — and  knew  must  grieve  the 
judicious.  While  the  choir  was  singing  the  closing 
hymn,  he  contrived  to  beckon  the  sexton  to  the  pulpit, 
and  described  and  located  Lemuel  to  him  as  well  as 
he  could  without  actually  pointing  him  out;  he 
said  that  he  wished  to  see  that  young  man  after 
church,  and  asked  the  sexton  to  bring  him  to  his 
room.  The  sexton  did  so  to  the  best  of  his  ability, 
but  the  young  man  whom  he  brought  was  not  Lemuel, 
and  had  to  be  got  rid  of  with  apologies. 

On  three  or  four  successive  Sundays  Lemuel's  face 
dawned  upon  the  minister  from  the  congregation, 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  201 

and  tasked  his  powers  of  impersonal  appeal  and 
mental  concentration  to  the  utmost.  It  never  ap 
peared  twice  in  the  same  place,  and  when  at  last 
Sewell  had  tutored  the  sexton  carefully  in  Lemuel's 
dress,  he  was  driven  to  despair  one  morning-  when 
he  saw  the  boy  sliding  along  between  the  seats  in 
the  gallery,  and  sitting  down  with  an  air  of  satis 
faction  in  an  entirely  new  suit  of  clothes. 

After  this  defeat  the  sexton  said  with  humorous 
sympathy,  "  Well,  there  ain't  anything  for  it  now, 
Mr.  Sewell,  but  a  detective,  or  else  an  advertisement 
in  the  Personals." 

Sewell  laughed  with  him  at  his  joke,  and  took 
what  comfort  he  could  from  the  evidence  of  prosper 
ity  which  Lemuel's  new  clothes  offered.  He  argued 
that  if  Barker  could  afford  to  buy  them  he  could  not 
be  in  immediate  need,  and  for  some  final  encounter 
with  him  he  trusted  in  Providence,  and  was  not  too 
much  cast  down  when  his  wife  made  him  recognise 
that  he  was  trusting  in  Luck.  It  was  an  ordeal  to 
look  forward  to  finding  Lemuel  sooner  or  later 
among  his  hearers  every  Sunday;  but  having  pre 
pared  his  nerves  for  the  shock,  as  men  adjust  their 
sensibilities  to  the  recurrent  pain  of  a  disease,  he 
came  to  bear  it  with  fortitude,  especially  as  he 
continually  reminded  himself  that  he  had  his  fixed 
purpose  to  get  at  Lemuel  at  last  and  befriend  him  in 
any  and  every  possible  way.  He  tried  hard  to  keep 
from  getting  a  grudge  against  him. 

At  the  hotel,  Lemuel  remained  in  much  of  his 
original  belief  in  the  fashion  and  social  grandeur  of 


202  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

the  ladies  who  formed  the  majority  of  Mrs.  Harmon's 
guests.  Our  womankind  are  prone  to  a  sort  of 
helpless  intimacy  with  those  who  serve  them ;  the 
ladies  had  an  instinctive  perception  of  Lemuel's 
trustiness,  and  readily  gave  him  their  confidence 
and  much  of  their  history.  He  came  to  know 
them  without  being  at  all  able  to  classify  them 
with  reference  to  society  at  large,  as  of  that 
large  tribe  among  us  who  have  revolted  from 
domestic  care,  and  have  skilfully  unseated  the  black 
rider  who  remains  mounted  behind  the  husband  of 
the  average  lady-boarder.  Some  of  them  had  never 
kept  house,  being  young  and  newly  married,  though 
of  this  sort  there  were  those  who  had  tried  it  in  flats, 
and  had  reverted  to  their  natural  condition  of 
boarding.  They  advised  Lemuel  not  to  take  a  flat, 
whatever  he  did,  unless  he  wanted  to  perish  at  once. 
Other  lady  boarders  had  broken  up  housekeeping 
•  during  the  first  years  of  the  war,  and  had  been 
boarding  round  ever  since,  going  from  hotels  in  the 
city  to  hotels  in  the  country,  and  back  again  with 
the  change  of  the  seasons ;  these  mostly  had  hus 
bands  who  had  horses,  and  they  talked  with  equal 
tenderness  of  the  husbands  and  the  horses,  so  that 
you  could  not  always  tell  which  Jim  or  Bob  was ; 
usually  they  had  no  children,  but  occasionally  they 
had  a  married  daughter,  or  a  son  who  lived  Wes4. 
There  were  several  single  ladies  :  one  wrho  seemed 
to  have  nothing  in  this  world  to  do  but  to  come  down 
to  her  meals,  and  another  a  physician  who  had  not 
been  able,  in  embracing  the  medical  profession,  to 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  203 

deny  herself  the  girlish  pleasure  of  her  pet  name, 
and  was  lettered  in  the  list  of  guests  in  the  entry  as 
Dr.  Cissie  Bluff.  In  the  attic,  which  had  a  north- 
light  favourable  to  their  work,  were  two  girls,  who 
were  studying  art  at  the  Museum;  one  of  them 
looked  delicate  at  first  sight,  and  afterwards  seemed 
merely  very  gentle,  with  a  clear-eyed  pallor  which 
was  not  unhealth.  A  student  in  the  Law  School  sat 
at  the  table  with  these  girls,  and  seemed  sometimes 
to  go  with  them  to  concerts  and  lectures.  From  his 
talk,  which  was  almost  the  only  talk  that  made  itself 
heard  in  the  dining-room,  it  appeared  that  he  was 
from  Wyoming  Territory ;  he  treated  the  young 
ladies  as  representative  of  Boston  and  its  prejudices, 
though  apparently  they  were  not  Bostonians.  There 
were  several  serious  and  retiring  couples,  of  whom  one 
or  otherwas  an  invalid,  and  several  who  were  poor,  and 
preferred  the  plated  gentility  of  Mrs.  Harmon's  hotel — 
it  was  called  the  St.  Albans ;  Mrs.  Harmon  liked  the 
name — to  the  genuine  poverty  of  such  housekeeping 
as  they  could  have  set  up.  About  each  of  these 
women  a  home  might  have  clung,  with  all  its  loves 
and  cares  ;  they  were  naturally  like  other  women ; 
but  here  they  were  ignoble  particles,  without 
attraction  for  one  another,  or  apparently  joy  for 
themselves,  impermanent,  idle,  listless  j  they  had  got 
rid  of  the  trouble  of  housekeeping,  and  of  its  dignity 
and  usefulness.  There  were  a  few  children  in  the 
house,  not  at  all  noisy ;  the  boys  played  on  the  side 
walk,  and  the  little  girls  stayed  in  their  rooms  with 
their  mothers,  and  rarely  took  the  air  oftenerthan  they. 


204  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

They  came  down  rather  later  to  breakfast,  and 
they  seemed  not  to  go  to  school ;  some  of  them  had 
piano  lessons  in  their  rooms.  Their  mothers  did  not 
go  out  much ;  sometimes  they  went  to  church  or  the 
theatre,  and  they  went  shopping.  But  they  had 
apparently  no  more  social  than  domestic  life.  Now 
and  then  they  had  a  friend  to  lunch  or  dinner ;  if  a 
lady  was  absent,  it  was  known  to  Mrs.  Harmon, 
and  through  her  to  the  other  ladies,  that  she  was 
spending  the  day  with  a  friend  of  hers  at  an  hotel 
in  Newton,  or  Lexington,  or  Woburn.  In  a  city  full 
of  receptions,  of  dinner-giving,  and  party-going, 
Mrs.  Harmon's  guests  led  the  lives  of  cloistered 
nuns,  so  far  as  such  pleasures  were  concerned; 
occasionally  a  transient  had  rooms  for  a  week  or  two, 
and  was  continually  going,  and  receiving  visits.  She 
became  the  object  of  a  certain  unenvious  curiosity 
with  the  other  ladies,  who  had  not  much  sociability 
among  themselves ;  they  waited  a  good  while  before 
paying  visits  at  one  another's  rooms,  and  then  were 
very  punctilious  not  to  go  again  until  their  calls  had 
been  returned.  They  were  all  doctoring  themselves; 
they  did  not  talk  gossip  or  scandal  much  ;  they  talked 
of  their  diseases  and  physicians,  and  their  married 
daughters  and  of  Mrs.  Harmon,  whom  they  censured 
for  being  too  easygoing.  Certain  of  them  devoured 
novels,  which  they  carried  about  clasped  to  their 
breasts  with  their  fingers  in  them  at  the  place  where 
they  were  reading  ;  they  did  not  often  speak  of  them, 
and  apparently  took  them  as  people  take  opium. 
The  men  were  the  husbands  or  fathers  of  the 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  205 

women,  and  were  wholly  without  the  domestic 
weight  or  consequence  that  belongs  to  men  living  in 
their  own  houses.  There  were  certain  old  bachelors, 
among  whom  were  two  or  three  decayed  branches  of 
good  Boston  families,  spendthrifts,  or  invalided 
bankrupts.  Mr.  Evans  was  practically  among  the 
single  gentlemen,  for  his  wife  never  appeared  in  the 
parlour  or  dining-room,  and  was  seen  only  when  she 
went  in  or  out,  heavily  veiled,  for  a  walk.  Lemuel 
heard  very  soon  that  she  had  suffered  a  shock  from 
the  death  of  her  son  on  the  cars ;  the  other  ladies 
made  much  of  her  inability  to  get  over  it,  and  said 
nothing  would  induce  them  to  have  a  son  of  theirs 
go  in  and  out  on  the  cars. 

Among  these  people,  such  as  they  were,  and  far  as 
they  might  be  from  a  final  civilisation,  Lemuel  began 
to  feel  an  ambition  to  move  more  lightly  and  quickly 
than  he  had  yet  known  how  to  do,  to  speak  promptly, 
and  to  appear  well.  Our  schooling  does  not  train  us 
to  graceful  or  even  correct  speech ;  even  our  colleges 
often  leave  that  uncouth.  Many  of  Mrs.  Harmon's 
boarders  spoke  bad  grammar  through  their  noses ; 
but  the  ladies  dressed  stylishly,  and  the  men  were 
good  arithmeticians.  Lemuel  obeyed  a  native 
impulse  rather  than  a  good  example  in  cultivating  a 
better  address;  but  the  incentive  to  thrift  and  fashion 
was  all  about  him.  He  had  not  been  ignorant  that 
his  clothes  were  queer  in  cut  and  out  of  date,  and 
during  his  stay  at  Miss  Vane's  he  had  taken  much 
council  with  himself  as  to  whether  he  ought  not  to 
get  a  new  suit  with  his  first  money  instead  of  send- 


206  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

ing  it  home.  ]NTow  he  had  solved  the  question,  after 
sending  the  money  home,  by  the  discovery  of  a  place 
on  a  degenerate  street,  in  a  neighbourhood  of 
Chinese  laundries,  with  the  polite  name  of  Misfit 
Parlours,  where  they  professed  to  sell  the  failures 
of  the  leading  tailors  of  Boston,  New  York,  and 
Chicago.  After  long  study  of  the  window  of  the 
Parlours,  Lemuel  ventured  within  one  day,  and  was 
told,  when  he  said  he  could  not  afford  the  suit  he 
fancied,  that  he  might  pay  for  it  on  the  instalment 
plan,  which  the  proprietor  explained  to  him.  In  the 
mirror  he  was  almost  startled  at  the  stylishness  of 
his  own  image.  The  proprietor  of  the  Parlours  com 
plimented  him.  "  You  see,  you  've  got  a  good  figure 
for  a  suit  of  clothes— what  I  call  a  ready-made 
figure.  You  can  go  into  a  clothing  store  anywheres 
and  fit  you." 

He  took  the  first  instalment  of  the  price,  with 
Lemuel's  name  and  address,  and  said  he  would  send 
the  clothes  round  ;  but  in  the  evening  he  brought 
them  himself,  and  no  doubt  verified  Lemuel's  state 
ment  by  this  device.  It  was  a  Saturday  night,  and 
the  next  morning  Lemuel  rose  early  to  put  them  on. 
He  meant  to  go  to  church  in  them,  and  in  the  after 
noon  he  did  not  know  just  what  he  should  do.  He 
had  hoped  that  some  chance  might  bring  them 
together  again,  and  then  he  could  see  from  the  way 
Miss  Dudley  and  'Manda  Grier  behaved,  just  what 
they  thought.  He  had  many  minds  about  the 
matter  himself,  and  had  gone  from  an  extreme  of 
self-abhorrence  to  one  of  self-vindication,  and  be- 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     207 

tween  these  he  had  halted  at  every  gradation  of 
blame  and  exculpation.  But  perhaps  what  chiefly 
kept  him  away  was  the  uncertainty  of  his  future ; 
till  he  could  give  some  shape  to  that  he  had  no 
courage  to  face  the  past.  Sometimes  he  wished 
never  to  see  either  of  those  girls  again ;  but  at  other 
times  he  had  a  longing  to  go  and  explain,  to  justify 
himself,  or  to  give  himself  up  to  justice. 

The  new  clothes  gave  him  more  heart  than  he  had 
yet  had,  but  the  most  he  could  bring  himself  to  do 
was  to  walk  towards  Pleasant  Avenue  the  next 
Sunday  afternoon,  which  Mrs.  Harmon  especially 
gave  him, — and  to  think  about  walking  up  and  down 
before  the  house.  It  ended  in  his  walking  up  and 
down  the  block,  first  on  one  side  of  the  street  and 
then  on  the  other.  He  knew  the  girls'  window; 
Miss  Dudley  had  shown  him  it  was  the  middle 
window  of  the  top  story  when  they  were  looking 
out  of  it,  and  he  glanced  up  at  it.  Then  he  hurried 
away,  but  he  could  not  leave  the  street  without  stop 
ping  at  the  corner,  to  cast  a  last  look  back  at  the 
house.  There  was  an  apothecary's  at  that  corner, 
and  while  he  stood  wistfully  staring  and  going  round 
the  corner  a  little  way,  and  coming  back  to  look  at 
the  things  in  the  apothecary's  window,  he  saw  'Manda 
Grier  come  swiftly  towards  him.  He  wanted  to  run 
away  now,  but  he  could  not ;  he  felt  nailed  to  the 
spot,  and  he  felt  the  colour  go  out  of  his  face.  She 
pretended  not  to  see  him  at  first ;  but  with  a  second 
glance  she  abandoned  the  pretence,  and  at  his  saying 
faintly,  "  Good  afternoon,"  she  said,  with  freezing 


208  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

surprise,  "  Oh  !     Good  afternoon,  Mr.  Barker  !  "  and 
passed  into  the  apothecary's. 

He  could  not  go  now,  since  he  had  spoken,  and 
leave  all  so  inconclusive  again  ;  and  yet  'Manda  Grier 
had  been  so  repellent,  so  cutting,  in  her  tone  and 
manner,  that  he  did  not  know  how  to  face  her 
another  time.  When  she  came  out  he  faltered,  "  I 
hope  there  isn't  anybody  sick  at  your  house,  Miss 
Grier." 

"  Oh,  nobody  that  you  '11  care  about,  Mr.  Barker," 
she  answered  airily,  and  began  to  tilt  rapidly  away, 
with  her  chin  thrust  out  before  her. 

He  made  a  few  paces  after  her,  and  then  stopped ; 
she  seemed  to  stop  too,  and  he  caught  up  with  her. 

" I  hope,"  he  gasped,  "there  ain't  anything  the 
matter  with  Miss  Dudley  ?  " 

"  Oh,  nothing  't  you  'II  care  about,"  said  'Manda 
Grier,  and  she  added  with  terrible  irony,  "  You  Ve 
b'en  round  to  inquire  so  much  that  you  hain't  allowed 
time  for  any  great  change." 

"  Has  she  been  sick  long  ?  "  faltered  Lemuel.  "  I 
didn't  dare  to-  come  !  "  he  cried  out.  "  I  've  been 
wanting  to  come,  but  I  didn't  suppose  you  would 
speak  to  me — any  of  you."  Now  his  tongue  was 
unlocked,  he  ran  on :  "I  don't  know  as  it 's  any 
excuse — there  ain't  any  excuse  for  such  a  thing  !  I 
know  she  must  perfectly  despise  me,  and  that  I  'm 
not  fit  for  her  to  look  at ;  but  I  'd  give  anything  if  I 
could  take  it  all  back  and  be  just  where  I  was  before. 
You  tell  her,  won't  you,  how  I  feel  ? " 

'Manda   Grier,  who  had  listened  with  a  killingly 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.    209 

averted  face,  turned  sharply  upon  him  :  "  You  mean 
about  stayin'  away  so  long  ?  I  don't  know  as  she 
cared  a  great  deal,  but  it 's  a  pretty  queer  way  of 
showin'  you  cared  for  her." 

"  I  didn't  mean  that  !  "  retorted  Lemuel ;  and  he 
added  by  an  immense  effort,  "  I  meant — the  way  I 
behaved  when  I  was  there ;  I  meant " 

"  Oh  !  "  said  'Manda  Grier,  turning  her  face  away 
again ;  she  turned  it  so  far  away  that  the  back  of 
her  head  was  all  that  Lemuel  could  see.  "  I  guess 
you  better  speak  to  Statira  about  that." 

By  this  time  they  had  reached  the  door  of  the 
boarding-house,  and  'Manda  Grier  let  herself  in  with 
her  latch-key.  "  Won't  you  walk  in,  Mr.  Barker  1 " 
she  said  in  formal  tones  of  invitation. 

"  Is  she  well  enough  to  see — company?  "  murmured 
Lemuel.  "  I  shouldn't  want  to.  disturb  her." 

"  I  don't  believe  but  what  she  can  see  you,"  said 
'Manda  Grier,  for  the  first  time  relentingly. 

"  All  right,"  said  Lemuel,  gulping  the  lump  in  his 
throat,  and  he  followed  'Manda  Grier  up  the  flights 
of  stairs  to  the  door  of  the  girls'  room,  which  she 
flung  open  without  knocking. 

"S'tira,"  she  said,  "here's  Mr.  Barker,"  and 
Lemuel,  from  the  dark  landing,  where  he  lurked  a 
moment,  could  see  Statira  sitting  in  the  rocking- 
chair  in  a  pretty  blue  dressing-gown  ;  after  a  first 
flush  she  looked  pale,  and  now  and  then  put  up  her 
hand  to  hide  a  hoarse  little  cough. 


XV. 


"  WALK  right  in,  Mr.  Barker,"  cried  'Manda  Grier, 
and  Lemuel  entered,  more  awkward  and  sheepish 
in  his  new  suit  from  the  Misfit  Parlours  than  he  had 
been  before  in  his  "Willoughby  Pastures  best  clothes. 
Statira  merely  said,  "  Why,  Mr.  Barker  ! "  and  stood 
at  her  chair  where  she  rose.  "  You  're  quite  a 
stranger.  Won't  you  sit  down  ?  " 

Lemuel  sat  down,  and  'Manda  Grier  said  politely, 
"  Won't  you  let  me  take  your  hat,  Mr.  Barker  ? "  and 
they  both  treated  him  with  so  much  ceremony  and 
deference  that  it  seemed  impossible  he  could  ever 
have  done  such  a  monstrous  thing  as  kiss  a  young 
lady  like  Miss  Dudley;  and  he  felt  that  he  never 
could  approach  the  subject  even  to  accept  a  just 
doom  at  her  hands. 

They  all  talked  about  the  weather  for  a  minute, 
and  then  'Manda  Grier  said,  "  Well,  I  guess  I  shall 
have  to  go  down  and  set  this  boneset  to  steep ;  "  and 
as  he  rose,  and  stood  to  let  her  pass,  she  caught  his 
arm,  and  gave  it  a  clutch.  He  did  not  know  whether 

she  did  it  on  purpose,  or  why  she  did  it,  but  some- 
210 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     211 

how  it  said  to  him  that  she  was  his  friend,  and  he 
did  not  feel  so  much  afraid. 

When  she  was  gone,  however,  he  returned  to  the 
weather  for  conversation  ;  but  when  Statira  said  it 
was  lucky  for  her  that  the  winter  held  off  so,  he  made 
out  to  inquire  about  her  sickness,  and  she  told  him 
that  she  had  caught  a  heavy  cold  ;  at  first  it  seemed 
just  to  be  a  head-cold,  but  afterwards  it  seemed  to 
settle  on  the  lungs,  and  it  seemed  as  if  she  never 
could  throw  it  off;  they  had  had  the  doctor  twice; 
but  now  she  was  better,  and  the  cough  was  nearly 
all  gone. 

"  I  guess  I  took  the  cold  that  day,  from  havin'  the 
window  open,"  she  concluded ;  and  she  passed  her 
hand  across  her  lap,  and  looked  down  demurely,  and 
then  up  at  the  ceiling,  and  her  head  twitched  a  little 
and  trembled. 

Lemuel  knew  that  his  hour  had  come,  if  ever  it 
were  to  come,  and  he  said  hoarsely:  "I  guess  if  I 
made  you  take  cold  that  day,  it  wasn't  all  I  did.  I 
guess  I  did  worse  than  that." 

She  did  not  look  at  him  and  pretend  ignorance, 
as  'Manda  Grier  would  have  done ;  but  lifting  her 
moist  eyes  and  then  dropping  them,  she  said,  "  Why, 
Mr.  Barker,  what  can  you  mean  1 " 

"You  know  what  I  mean,"  he  retorted,  with 
courage  astonishing  to  him.  "  It  was  because  I  liked 
you  so  much."  He  could  not  say  loved ;  it  seemed 
too  bold.  "  There  's  nothing  else  can  excuse  it,  and 
I  don't  know  as  lhat  can." 

She  put  up  her  hands  to  her  eyes,  and  began  to  cry, 


212  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

and  he  rose  and  went  to  her,  and  said,  "  Oh,  don't 
cry,  don't  cry ! "  and  somehow  he  took  hold  of  her 
hands,  and  then  her  arms  went  round  his  neck,  and 
she  was  crying  on  his  breast. 

"  You  '11  think  I  'm  rather  of  a  silly  person,  crying 
so  much  about  nothing,"  she  said,  when  she  lifted 
her  head  from  his  shoulder  to  wipe  her  eyes.  "But 
I  can't  seem  to  help  it,"  and  she  broke  down  again. 
"  I  presume  it 's  because  I  Ve  been  sick,  and  I  'm 
kind  of  weak  yet.  I  know  you  wouldn't  have  done 
that,  that  day,  if  you  hadn't  have  cared  for  me ;  and 
I  wasn't  mad  a  bit ;  not  half  as  mad  as  I  ought  to 
have  been  ;  but  when  you  stayed  away  so  long,  and 
never  seemed  to  come  near  any  more,  I  didn't  know 
what  to  think.  But  now  I  can  understand  just  how 
you  felt,  and  I  don't  blame  you  one  bit ;  I  should  have 
done  just  so  myself  if  I  'd  been  a  man,  I  suppose.  And 
now  it's  all  come  right,  I  don't  mind  being  sick  or  any 
thing  ;  only  when  Thanksgiving  came,  we  felt  sure 
you  'd  call,  and  we  'd  got  the  pies  nicely  warmed.  Oh 
dear  ! "  She  gave  way  again,  and  then  pressed  her 
cheek  tight  against  his  to  revive  herself.  "  'Manda 
said  she  knew  it  was  just  because  you  was  kind  of 
ashamed,  and  I  was  too  sick  to  eat  any  of  the  pies,  any 
way;  and  so  it  all  turned  out  for  the  best ;  and  I  don't 
want  you  to  believe  that  I  'm  one  to  cry  over  spilt 
milk,  especially  when  it 's  all  gathered  up  again  ! " 

Her  happy  tongue  ran  on,  revealing,  divining 
everything,  and  he  sat  down  with  her  in  his  arms, 
hardly  speaking  a  word,  till  her  heart  was  quite 
poured  out.  'Manda  Grier  left  them  a  long  time 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     213 

together,  and  before  she  came  back  he  had  told 
Statira  all  about  himself  since  their  last  meeting. 
She  was  very  angry  at  the  way  that  girl  had  behaved  at 
Miss  Vane's,  but  she  was  glad  he  had  found  such  a  good 
place  now,  without  being  beholden  to  any  one  for  it, 
and  she  showed  that  she  felt  a  due  pride  in  his  being 
an  hotel  clerk.  He  described  the  hotel,  and  told  what 
he  had  to  do  there,  and  about  Mrs.  Harmon  and  the 
fashionableness  of  all  the  guests.  But  he  said  he 
did  not  think  any  of  the  ladies  went  ahead  of  her  in 
dress,  if  they  came  up  to  her ;  and  Statira  pressed 
her  lips  gratefully  against  his  cheek,  and  then  lifting 
her  head  held  herself  a  little  away  to  see  him  again, 
and  said,  "  You  're  splendidly  dressed  too  ;  I  noticed 
it  the  first  thing  when  you  came  in.  You  look  just 
as  if  you  had  always  lived  in  Boston." 

"  Is  that  so  1 "  asked  Lemuel ;  and  he  felt  his  heart 
suffused  with  tender  pride  and  joy.  He  told  her  of 
the  Misfit  Parlours  and  the  instalment  plan,  and  she 
said,  well,  it  was  just  splendid;  and  she  asked  him  if  he 
knew  she  wasn't  in  the  store  any  more  ;  and  "  No," 
she  added  delightedly,  upon  his  confession  of  ignor 
ance,  "I'm  going  to  work  in  the  box-factory,  after 
this,  where  'Manda  Grier  works.  It 's  better  pay, 
and  you  have  more  control  of  your  hours,  and  you 
can  set  down  while  you  work,  if  you  've  a  mind  to. 
I  think  it 's  going  to  be  splendid.  What  should  you 
say  if  'Manda  Grier  and  me  took  some  rooms  and 
went  to  housekeepin'  1 " 

"  I  don't  know,"  said  Lemuel ;  but  in  his  soul  he 
felt  jealous  of  her  keeping  house  with  'Manda  Grier. 


214  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

"  Well,  I  don't  know  as  we  shall  do  it,"  said 
Statira,  as  if  feeling  his  tacit  reluctance. 

'Manda  Grier  came  in  just  then,  and  cast  a  glance 
of  friendly  satire  at  them.  "  Well,  I  declare  !  "  she 
said,  for  all  recognition  of  the  situation. 

Lemuel  made  an  offer  to  rise,  but  Statira  would 
not  let  him.  "  I  guess  'Manda  Grier  won't  mind  it 
much." 

"  I  guess  I  can  stand  it  if  you  can,"  said  'Manda 
Grier  ;  and  this  seemed  such  a  witty  speech  that  they 
all  laughed,  till,  as  Statira  said,  she  thought  she 
should  die.  They  laughed  the  more  when  'Manda 
ferier  added  dryly,  "I  presume  you  won't  want  your 
boneset  now."  She  set  the  vessel  she  had  brought  it 
up  in  on  the  stove,  and  covered  it  with  a  saucer.  "  I 
do'  know  as  I  should  if  I  was  in  your  place.  It 's 
kind  o'  curious  I  should  bring  both  remedies  home 
with  me  at  once."  At  this  they  all  laughed  a  third 
time,  till  'Manda  Grier  said,  "  'Sh  !  'sh  !  Do  you 
want  to  raise  the  roof  ? " 

She  began  to  bustle  about,  and  to  set  out  a  little 
table,  and  cover  it  with  a  napkin,  and  as  she  worked 
she  talked  on.  "I  guess  if  you  don't  want  any 
boneset  tea,  a  little  of  the  other  kind  won't  hurt  any 
of  us,  and  I  kinder  want  a  cup  myself."  She  set  it 
to  steep  on  the  stove,  and  it  went  through  Lemuel's 
mind  that  she  might  have  steeped  the  boneset  there 
too,  if  she  had  thought  of  it ;  but  he  did  not  say 
anything,  though  it  seemed  a  pretty  good  joke  on 
'Manda  Grier.  She  ran  on  in  that  way  of  hers  so 
that  you  never  could  tell  whether  she  really  meant 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     215 

a  thing  or  not.  "  I  guess  if  I  have  to  manage  many 
more  cases  like  yours,  S'tira  Dudley,  I  shall  want 
to  lay  in  a  whole  chest  of  it.  What  do  you  think, 
Mr.  Barker  ]  " 

"  Mr.  Barker  !  "  repeated  Statira. 

"  Well,  I  'm  afraid  to  say  Lemuel  any  more,  for 
fear  he  '11  fly  off  the  handle,  and  never  come  again. 
What  do  you  think,  Mr.  Barker,  of  havin'  to  set  at 
that  window  every  Sunday  for  the  last  three  weeks, 
and  keep  watch  of  both  sidewalks  till  you  get  such 
a  crick  in  your  neck,  and  your  eyes  so  set  in  your 
head,  you  couldn't  move  either  of  'em  ?  " 

"  Now,  'Manda  Grier  !  "  said  Statira  from  Lemuel's 
shoulder. 

"  Well,  I  don't  say  I  had  to  do  it,  and  I  don't  say 
who  the  young  man  was  that  I  was  put  to  look 
out  for— 


"  But  I  do  say  it  's  pretty  hard  to  wait  on  a  sick 
person  one  side  the  room,  and  keep  watch  for  a 
young  man  the  other  side,  both  at  once." 

"  'Manda  Grier,  you  're  too  bad  !  "  pouted  Statira. 
"  Don't  you  believe  a  word  she  says,  Mr.  Barker." 

"Mr.  Barker  /"  repeated  'Manda  Grier. 

"Well,  I  don't  care  !  "  said  Statira,  "  I  know  who 
I  mean." 

"/  don't,"  said  'Manda  Grier.  "And  I  didn't 
know  wrho  you  meant  this  afternoon  when  you  wras 
standin'  watch  't  the  window,  and  says  you,  '  There  ! 
there  he  is  !  '  and  I  had  to  run  so  quick  with  the 
dipper  of  water  I  had  in  my  hand  to  water  the 


216  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

plants  that  I  poured  it  all  over  the  front  of  my 
dress." 

"  Do  you  believe  her  ?  "  asked  Statira. 

"And  I  didn't  know  who  you  meant,"  proceeded 
'Manda  Grier,  busy  with  the  cups  and  saucers, "  when 
you  kept  hurryin'  me  up  to  change  it ;  '  Oh,  quick, 
quick  !  How  long  you  are  !  I  know  he  '11  get  away ; 
I  know  he  will ! '  and  I  had  to  just  sling  on  a  shawl 
and  rush  out  after  this  boneset." 

"  There  !  Now  that  shows  she  's  inakin'  it  all  up  ! " 
cried'  Statira.  "  She  put  on  a  sack,  and  I  helped  her 
on  with  it  myself.  So  there  !  " 

"  Well,  if  it  was  a  sack  !  And  after  all,  the  young 
man  was  gone  when  I  got  down  hit'  the  street," 
concluded  'Manda  Grier  solemnly. 

Lemuel  had  thought  she  was  talking  about  him ; 
but  now  a  pang  of  jealousy  went  through  him,  and 
showed  at  the  eyes  he  fixed  on  her. 

"  I  don't  know  what  I  sh'd  'a'  done,"  she  resumed 
demurely,  "if  I  hadn't  have  found  Mr.  Barker  at 
the  apothecary's  and  got  him  to  come  home  'th  me ; 
but  of  course,  'twan't  the  same  as  if  it  was  the  young 
man  ! " 

Lemuel's  arm  fell  from  Statira's  waist  in  his 
torment. 

"  Why,  Lemuel !  "  she  said  in  tender  reproach. 

"  Why,  you  coot  !  "  cried  'Manda  Grier  in  utter 
amazement  at  his  single- mindedness  ;  and  burst  into 
a  scream  of  laughter.  She  took  the  teapot  from  the 
stove,  and  set  it  on  the  table.  "There,  young  man 
— if  you  are  the  young  man — you  better  pull  up  to 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  217 

the  table,  and  have  something  to  start  your  ideas. 
S'tira  !  Let  him  come  !  "  and  Lemuel,  blushing  for 
shame  at  his  stupidity,  did  as  he  was  bid. 

"I've  got  the  greatest  mind  in  the  world  to  set 
next  to  S'tira  myself,"  said  'Manda  Grier,  "for  fear 
she  should  miss  that  young  man  ! "  and  now  they 
both  laughed  together  at  Lemuel ;  but  the  girls  let 
him  sit  between  them,  and  Statira  let  him  keep  one 
of  her  hands  under  the  table,  as  much  as  she  could. 
"  I  never  saw  such  a  jealous  piece  !  Why,  I  shall 
begin  to  be  afraid  for  myself.  What  should  you 
think  of  S'tira's  going  to  housekeeping  with  me  ? " 

"  I  don't  believe  he  likes  the  idea  one  bit,"  Statira 
answered  for  him. 

"Oh  yes,  I  do  !"  Lemuel  protested. 

"  'D  you  tell  him  1 "  'Manda  Grier  demanded  of 
her.  She  nodded  with  saucy  defiance.  "  Well,  you 
have  got  along !  And  about  the  box-factory  1 " 
Statira  nodded  again,  with  a  look  of  joyous  in 
telligence  at  Lemuel.  "  Well,  what  hain't  you  told,  I 
wonder  !  "  'Manda  Grier  added  seriously  to  Lemuel, 
"I  think  it'll  be  about  the  best  thing  in  the  world 
for  S'tira.  I  see  for  the  last  six  months  she  's  been 
killin'  herself  in  that  store.  She  can't  ever  get  a 
chance  to  set  down  a  minute ;  and  she 's  on  her 
feet  from  mornin'  till  night ;  and  I  think  it 's  more  'n 
half  that  that 's  made  her  sick  ;  I  don't  say  what 
the  other  four-fifths  was  ! 

"Now,  'Manda  Grier,  stop  !" 

"  Well,  that 's  over  with  now,  and  now  we  want  to 
keep  you  out  that  store.  I  been  lookin'  out  for  this 


218  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

place  for  S'tira  a  good  while.  She  can  go  onto  the 
small  boxes,  if  she  wants  to,  and  she  can  set  down 
all  the  time  ;  and  she  '11  have  a  whole  hour  for  her 
dinner ;  and  she  can  work  by  the  piece,  and  do  as 
much  or  as  little  as  she  's  a  mind  to ;  but  if  she  's  a 
mind  to  work  she  can  make  her  five  and  six  dollars 
a  week,  easy.  Mr.  Stevens  's  real  nice  and  kind,  and 
he  looks  out  for  the  girls  that  ain't  exactly  strong 
— not  but  what  S'tira  's  as  strong  as  anybody,  when 
she  's  well —  and  he  don't  put  'em  on  the  green  paper 
work,  because  it's  got  arsenic  in  it,  and  it  makes 
your  head  ache,  and  you  're  liable  to  blood  poisonin'. 
One  the  girls  fainted  and  had  spasms,  and  as  soon 
as  he  found  it  out  he  took  her  right  off;  and  he's 
just  like  clockwork  to  pay.  I  think  it  '11  do  every 
thing  for  S'tira  to  be  along  'th  me  there,  where  I  can 
look  after  her." 

Lemuel  said  he  thought  so  too ;  he  did  not  really 
think  at  all,  he  was  so  flattered  at  being  advised 
with  about  Statira,  as  if  she  were  in  his  keeping  and 
it  was  for  him  to  say  what  was  best  for  her ;  and 
•when  she  seemed  uncertain  about  his  real  opinion, 
and  said  she  was  not  going  to  do  anything  he  did  not 
approve  of,  he  could  scarcely  speak  for  rapture,  but  he 
protested  that  he  did  approve  of  the  scheme  entirely. 

"  But  you  shouldn't  want  we  girls  to  set  up  house 
keeping  in  rooms  ?  "  she  suggested  ;  and  he  said  that 
he  should,  and  that  he  thought  it  would  be  more 
independent  and  home-like. 

"We're  half  doin'  it  now,"  said  'Manda  Grier, 
"and  I  know  some  rooms — two  of  'em — where  we 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     219 

could  get  along  first  rate,   and  not  cost  us  much 
more  'n  half  what  it  does  here." 

After  she  cleared  up  the  tea-things  she  made 
another  errand  downstairs,  and  Lemuel  and  Statira 
went  back  to  their  rocking-chair.  It  still  amazed 
him  that  she  seemed  not  even  to  make  it  a  favour 
to  him ;  she  seemed  to  think  it  was  favour  to  her. 
What  was  stranger  yet  was  that  he  could  not  feel 
that  there  was  anything  wrong  or  foolish  about  it ; 
he  thought  of  his  mother's  severity  about  young 
folks'  sickishness,  as  she  called  it,  and  he  could  not 
understand  it.  He  knew  that  he  had  never  had 
such  right  and  noble  thoughts  about  girls  before ; 
perhaps  Statira  was  better  than  other  girls ;  she 
must  be  ;  she  was  just  like  a  child ;  and  he  must  be 
very  good  himself  to  be  anyways  fit  for  her ;  if  she 
cared  so  much  for  him,  it  must  be  a  sign  that  he 
was  not  so  bad  as  he  had  sometimes  thought.  A 
great  many  things  went  through  his  mind,  the 
silent  comment  and  suggestion  of  their  talk,  and  all 
the  time  while  he  was  saying  something  or  listening 
to  her,  he  was  aware  of  the  overwhelming  wonder 
of  her  being  so  frank  with  him,  and  not  too  proud 
or  ashamed  to  have  him  know  how  anxious  she  had 
been,  ever  since  they  first  met,  for  fear  he  did  not 
care  for  her.  She  had  always  appeared  so  stylish 
and  reserved,  and  now  she  was  not  proud  at  all.  He 
tried  to  tell  her  how  it  had  been  wTith  him  the  last 
three  weeks ;  all  that  he  could  say  was  that  he  had 
been  afraid  to  come.  She  laughed,  and  said,  the 
idea  of  his  being  afraid  of  her !  She  said  that  she 


220  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

was  glad  of  everything  she  had  gone  through.  At 
times  she  lifted  herself  from  his  shoulder  and 
coughed ;  but  that  was  when  she  had  been  laughing 
or  crying  a  little.  They  told  each  other  about  their 
families  ;  Statira  said  she  had  not  really  any  folks 
of  her  own ;  she  was  just  brought  up  by  her  aunt ; 
and  Lemuel  had  to  tell  her  that  his  mother  wore 
bloomers.  Statira  said  she  guessed  she  should  not 
care  much  for  the  bloomers ;  and  in  everything  she 
tried  to  make  out  that  he  was  much  better  than  she 
was,  and  just  exactly  right.  She  already  spoke  of 
his  sister  by  her  first  name,  and  she  entered  into  his 
whole  life,  as  if  she  had  always  known  him.  He 
said  she  must  come  with  him  to  hear  Mr.  Sewell 
preach,  sometime  ;  but  she  declared  that  she  did  not 
think  much  of  a  minister  who  could  behave  the  way 
he  had  done  to  Lemuel.  He  defended  Sewell,  and 
maintained  that  if  it  had  not  been  for  him  he  might 
not  have  come  to  Boston,  and  so  might  never  have 
seen  her ;  but  she  held  out  that  she  could  not  bear 
Mr.  Sewell,  and  that  she  knew  he  was  double-faced, 
and  everything.  Lemuel  said  well,  he  did  not  know 
that  he  should  ever  have  anything  more  to  do  with 
him  ;  but  he  liked  to  hear  him  preach,  and  he  guessed 
he  tried  to  do  what  was  about  right.  Statira  made 
him  promise  that  if  ever  he  met  Mr.  Sewell  again, 
he  would  not  make  up  to  him,  any  way;  and  she 
would  not  tolerate  the  thought  of  Miss  Vane. 

"  What  you  two  quar'lin'  about  ? "  demanded 
'Manda  Grier,  coming  suddenly  into  the  room  ;  and 
that  turned  their  retrospective  griefs  into  joy  again. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  221 

"  I  'm  scoldin'  him  because  he  don't  think  enough 
of  himself,"  cried  Statira. 

"  Well,  he  seems  to  take  it  pretty  meekly,"  said 
'Manda  Grier.  "  I  guess  you  didn't  scold  very  hard. 
Now,  young  man,"  she  added  to  Lemuel,  "  I  guess 
you  better  be  goin'.  It's  five  o'clock,  and  if  you 
should  be  out  after  dark,  and  the  bears  should  get 
you,  I  don't  know  what  S'tira  would  do." 

"  'Tain't  five  yet !  "  pleaded  Statira.  "  That  old 
watch  of  yours  is  always  tryin'  to  beat  the  town 
clock." 

"Well,  it's  the  clock  that's  ahead  this  time," 
said  'Manda  Grier.  "My  watch  says  quarter  of. 
Come,  now,  S'tira,  you  let  him  go,  or  he  sha'n't  come 
back  any  more." 

They  had  a  parting  that  Lemuel's  mother  would 
have  called  sickish  without  question;  but  it  all 
seemed  heavenly  sweet  and  right.  Statira  said  now 
he  had  got  to  kiss  'Manda  Grier  too ;  and  when  he 
insisted,  her  chin  knocked  against  his,  and  saved 
her  lips,  and  she  gave  him  a  good  box  on  the  ear. 

"There,  I  guess  that'll  do  for  one  while,"  she 
said,  arranging  her  tumbled  hair ;  "  but  there  's  more 
kisses  where  that  came  from,  for  both  of  you  if  you 
want  'em.  Coots  ! " 

Once,  when  Lemuel  was  little,  he  had  a  fever,  and 
he  was  always  seeming  to  glide  down  the  school- 
house  stairs  without  touching  the  steps  with  his  feet. 
He  remembered  this  dream  now,  when  he  reached 
the  street ;  he  felt  as  if  he  had  floated  down  on  the 
air ;  and  presently  he  was  back  in  his  little  den  at 


222  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE. 

the  hotel,  he  did  not  know  how.  He  ran  the  elevator 
up  and  down  for  the  ladies  who  called  him  from  the 
different  floors,  and  he  took  note  of  the  Sunday 
difference  in  their  toilet  as  they  passed  in  to  tea ; 
but  in  the  same  dreamy  way. 

After  the  boarders  had  supped,  he  went  in  as 
usual  with  Mrs.  Harmon's  nephew,  less  cindery  than 
on  week-days,  from  the  cellar,  and  Mrs.  Harmon, 
silken  smooth  for  her  evening  worship  at  the  shrine 
of  a  popular  preacher  from  New  York.  The  Sunday 
evening  before,  she  had  heard  an  agnostic  lecture  in 
the  Boston  Theatre,  and  she  said  she  wished  to 
compare  notes.  Her  tranquillity  was  unruffled  by  the 
fact  that  the  head-waitress  had  left,  just  before  tea; 
she  presumed  they  could  get  along  just  as  well 
without  her  as  with  her :  the  boarders  had  spoiled 
her,  anyway.  She  looked  round  at  Lemuel's  face, 
which  beamed  with  his  happiness,  and  said  she 
guessed  she  should  have  to  get  him  to  open  the 
dining-room  doors,  and  seat  the  transients  the  next 
few  days,  till  she  could  get  another  head-waitress. 
It  did  not  seem  to  be  so  much  a  request  as  a  resolu 
tion  ;  but  Lemuel  willingly  assented.  Mrs.  Harmon's 
nephew  said  that  so  long  as  they  did  not  want  him 
to  do  it  he  did  not  care  who  did  it ;  and  if  a  few  of 
them  had  his  furnace  to  look  after  they  would  not 
be  so  anxious  to  kick 


XVI. 

LEMUEL  had  to  be  up  early  in  the  morning  to  get 
the  bills  of  fare,  which  Mrs.  Harmon  called  the 
Meanyous,  written  in  time  for  the  seven  o'clock 
breakfasters ;  and  after  opening  the  dining-room 
doors  with  fit  ceremony,  he  had  to  run  backward 
and  forward  to  answer  the  rings  at  the  elevator,  and 
to  pull  out  the  chairs  for  the  ladies  at  the  table,  and 
slip  them  back  under  them  as  they  sat  down.  The 
ladies  at  the  St.  Albans  expected  to  get  their  money's 
worth ;  but  their  exactions  in  most  things  were  of 
use  to  Lemuel.  He  grew  constantly  nimbler  of  hand 
and  foot  under  them,  and  he  grew  quicker-witted  ; 
he  ceased  to  hulk  in  mind  and  body.  He  did  not 
employ  this  new  mental  agility  in  devising  excuses 
and  delays  ;  he  left  that  to  Mrs.  Harmon,  whose  con 
science  was  easy  in  it ;  but  from  seven  o'clock  in  the 
morning  till  eleven  at  night,  when  the  ladies  came 
in  from  the  theatre,  he  was  so  promptly,  so  com 
fortingly  at  their  service,  that  they  all  said  they  did 
not  see  how  they  had  ever  got  along  without  him. 

His  activities  took  the  form  of  interruptions 
rather  than  constant  occupation,  and  he  found  a  good 

223 


224  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

deal  of  broken-up  time  on  his  hands,  which  he 
passed  in  reading,  and  in  reveries  of  Statira.  At  the 
hours  when  the  elevator  was  mostly  in  use  he  kept  a 
book  in  it  with  him,  and  at  other  times  he  had  it 
in  the  office,  as  Mrs.  Harmon  called  his  little  booth. 
He  remained  there  reading  every  night  after  the 
house  quieted  down  after  dinner,  until  it  was  time  to 
lock  up  for  the  night ;  and  several  times  Mr.  Evans 
stopped  and  looked  in  at  him  where  he  sat  in  the 
bad  combustion  of  the  gas  that  was  taking  the 
country  tan  out  of  his  cheeks.  One  night  when  he 
came  in  late,  and  Lemuel  put  his  book  down  to  take 
him  up  in  the  elevator,  he  said,  "  Don't  disturb 
yourself ;  I  'm  going  to  walk  up,"  but  he  lingered  at 
the  door  looking  in  with  the  queer  smile  that  always 
roused  the  ladies'  fears  of  tacit  ridicule.  "  I  suppose 
you  don't  find  it  necessary,"  he  said  finally,  "to 
chase  a  horse-car  now,  when  you  want  to  find  your 
way  to  a  given  point  1 " 

Lemuel  reddened  and  dropped  his  head ;  he  had 
already  recognised  in  Mr.  Evans  the  gentleman  from 
whose  kindly  curiosity  lie  had  turned,  that  first  day, 
in  the  suspicion  that  he  might  be  a  beat.  "  No,"  he 
said,  "  I  guess  I  can  go  pretty  near  everywhere  in 
Boston  now." 

"Well,"  said  Mr.  Evans,  "it  was  an  ingenious 
system.  How  do  you  like  Boston  1  " 

"  I  like  it  first-rate,  but  I  Ve  not  seen  many  other 
places,"  answered  Lemuel  cautiously. 

"  Well,  if  you  live  here  long  enough  you  won't 
care  to  see  any  other  places;  you'll  know  they're 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     225 

not  worth  seeing."  Lemuel  looked  up  as  if  he  did  not 
understand  exactly,  and  Mr.  Evans  stepped  in  and 
lifted  the  book  he  had  been  reading.  It  was  one  he 
had  bought  at  second  hand  while  he  was  with  Miss 
Vane  :  a  tough  little  epitome  of  the  philosophies  in 
all  times,  the  crabbed  English  version  of  a  dry 
German  original.  Mr.  Evans  turned  its  leaves 
over.  "  Do  you  find  it  a  very  exciting  story  ?  "  he 
asked. 

"  Why,  it  isn't  a  story,"  said  Lemuel,  in  simple 
surprise. 

"  No  ?  "  asked  Mr.  Evans.  "  I  thought  it  must  be. 
Most  of  the  young  gentlemen  who  run  the  elevators 
I  travel  in  read  stories.  Do  you  like  this  kind  of 
reading  ? " 

Lemuel  reflected,  and  then  he  said  he  thought 
you  ought  to  find  out  about  such  things  if  you 
got  a  chance. 

"  Yes,"  said  the  editor  musingly,  "  I  suppose  one 
oughtn't  to  throw  any  sort  of  chance  away.  But 
you  're  sure  you  don't  prefer  the  novels  ?  You  '11 
excuse  my  asking  you  1  " 

"Oh,  perfectly  excusable,"  said  Lemuel.  He 
added  that  he  liked  a  good  novel  too,  when  he 
could  get  hold  of  it. 

"  You  must  come  to  my  room  some  day,  and  see  if 
you  can't  get  hold  of  one  there.  Or  if  you  prefer 
metaphysics,  I  've  got  shelves  full  that  you  're 
welcome  to.  I  suppose,"  he  added,  "you  hadn't 
been  in  Boston  a  great  while  when  I  met  you 
that  day  ? >; 

P 


226  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

"No,"  said  Lemuel,  dropping  his  head  again,  "I 
had  just  come." 

As  if  he  saw  that  something  painful  lurked  under 
the  remembrance  of  the  time  for  Lemuel  the  editor 
desisted. 

The  next  morning  he  stopped  on  his  way  to 
breakfast  with  some  books  which  he  handed  to 
Lemuel.  "  Don't  feel  at  all  obliged  to  read  them," 
he  said,  "  because  I  lend  them  to  you.  They  won't 
be  of  the  least  use  to  you,  if  you  do  so." 

11 1  guess  that  anything  you  like  will  be  worth 
reading,"  said  Lemuel,  flattered  by  the  trouble  so 
chief  a  boarder  as  Mr.  Evans  had  taken  with  him. 

"Not  if  they  supplied  a  want  you  didn't  feel. 
You  seem  to  be  fond  of  books,  and  after  a  while 
you'll  be  wanting  to  lend  them  yourself.  I'll  give 
you  a  little  hint  that  I  'm  too  old  to  profit  by : 
remember  that  you  can  lend  a  person  more  books  in 
a  day  than  he  can  read  in  a  week." 

His  laugh  kept  Lemuel  shy  of  him  still,  in  spite 
of  a  willingness  that  the  editor  showed  for  their 
.better  acquaintance.  He  seemed  to  wish  to  know 
about  Lemuel,  particularly  since  he  had  recognised 
the  pursuer  of  the  horse-car  in  him,  and  this  made 
Lemuel  close  up  the  more.  He  would  have  liked  to 
talk  with  him  about  the  books  Evans  had  lent  him. 
But  when  the  editor  stopped  at  the  office  door, 
where  Lemuel  sat  reading  one  of  them,  and  asked 
him  what  he  thought  of  it,  the  boy  felt  that 
somehow  it  was  not  exactly  his  opinion  that  Mr. 
Evans  was  getting  at;  and  this  sense  of  being 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  227 

inspected  and  arranged  in  another's  mind,  though 
he  could  not  formulate  the  operation  in  his  own, 
somehow  wounded  and  repelled  him.  It  was  not 
that  the  editor  ever  said  anything  that  was  not 
kind  and  friendly ;  he  was  always  doing  kind 
and  friendly  things,  and  he  appeared  to  take  a 
real  interest  in  Lemuel.  At  the  end  of  the  first 
week  after  Lemuel  had  added  the  head  waitership 
to  his  other  duties,  Evans  stopped  in  going  out  of 
the  dining-room  and  put  a  dollar  in  his  hand. 

"  What  is  it  for  ?  "  asked  Lemuel. 

"  For  ?  Eeally,  I  don't  know.  It  must  be  tribute- 
money,"  said  the  editor  in  surprise,  but  with  a  rising 
curiosity.  "  I  never  know  what  it  's  for." 

Lemuel  turned  red,  and  handed  it  back.  "  I  don't 
know  as  I  want  any  money  I  haven't  earned." 

That  night,  after  dinner,  when  Evans  was  passing 
the  office  door  on  his  way  out  of  the  hotel,  Lemuel 
stopped  him  and  said  with  embarrassment,  "  Mr. 
Evans,  I  don't  want  you  should  think  I  didn't 
appreciate  your  kindness  this  morning." 

"Ah,  I'm  not  sure  it  was  kindness,"  said  Evans 
with  immediate  interest.  "  Why  didn't  you  take 
the  money  1 " 

"  Well,  I  told  you  why,"  said  Lemuel,  overcoming 
the  obscure  reluctance  he  felt  at  Evans's  manner  as 
best  he  could.  "  I  Ve  been  thinking  it  over,  and  I 
guess  I  was  right ;  but  I  didn't  know  whether  I  had 
expressed  it  the  best  way." 

"The  way  couldn't  be  improved.  But  why  did 
you  think  you  hadn't  earned  my  dollar  ? " 


228  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"  I  don't  do  anything  but  open  the  doors,  and  show 
people  to  their  places ;  I  don't  call  that  anything." 

"  But  if  you  were  a  waiter  and  served  at  table  1 " 

"  I  wouldn't  be  one,"  said  Lemuel,  with  a  touch  of 
indignation ;  "  and  I  shouldn't  take  presents,  any  way." 

Evans  leaned  against  the  door-jamb. 

"  Have  you  heard  of  the  college  students  who  wait 
at  the  mountain  hotels  in  vacation  1  They  all  take 
fees.  Do  you  think  yourself  better  than  they  are  1 " 

"  Yes,  I  do  !  "  cried  Lemuel. 

"Well,  I  don't  know  but  you  are,"  said  the 
editor  thoughtfully.  "But  I  think  I  should  dis 
tinguish.  Perhaps  there 's  no  shame  in  waiting  at 
table,  but  there  is  in  taking  fees." 

"  Yes ;  that 's  what  I  meant,"  said  Lemuel,  a  little 
sorry  for  his  heat.  "  I  shouldn't  be  ashamed  to  do 
any  kind  of  work,  and  to  take  my  pay  for  it ;  but  I 
shouldn't  want  to  have  folks  giving  me  money  over 
and  above,  as  if  I  was  a  beggar." 

The  editor  stood  looking  him  absently  in  the  face. 
After  a  moment'  he  asked,  "  What  part  of  New 
England  did  you  come  from,  Mr.  Barker  1  " 

"  I  came  from  the  middle  part  of  the  State — from 
Willoughby  Pastures." 

"Do  those  ideas — those  principles — of  yours 
prevail  there  1 " 

"I  don't  know  whether  they  do  or  not,"  said 
Lemuel. 

"If  you  were  sure  they  did,  I  should  like  to 
engage  board  there  for  next  summer,"  said  the 
editor,  going  out. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     229 

It  was  Monday  night,  a  leisure  time  with  him,  and 
he  was  going  out  to  see  a  friend,  a  minister,  with 
whom  Monday  night  was  also  leisure  time. 

After  he  was  gone,  some  of  the  other  boarders 
began  to  drop  in  from  the  lectures  and  concerts 
which  they  frequented  in  the  evening.  The  ladies 
had  all  some  favour  to  ask  of  Lemuel,  some  real  or 
fancied  need  of  his  help ;  in  return  for  his  promise 
or  performance,  they  each  gave  him  advice.  What 
they  expressed  collectively  was  that  they  should 
think  that  he  would  put  his  eyes  out  reading  by  that 
gas,  and  that  he  had  better  look  out,  or  he  would 
ruin  his  health  anyway,  reading  so  much.  They 
asked  him  how  much  time  he  got  for  sleep  ;  and  they 
said  that  from  twelve  till  six  was  not  enough,  and 
that  he  was  just  killing  himself.  They  had  all  offered 
to  lend  him  books ;  the  least  literary  among  them 
had  a  sort  of  house  pride  in  his  fondness  for  books ; 
their  sympathy  with  this  taste  of  his  amused  their 
husbands,  who  tolerated  it,  but  in  their  hearts  re 
garded  it  as  a  womanish  weakness,  indicating  a  want 
of  fibre  in  Lemuel.  Mrs.  Harmon  as  a  business 
woman,  and  therefore  occupying  a  middle  ground 
between  the  sexes,  did  not  exactly  know  herself  what 
to  make  of  her  clerk's  studiousness ;  all  that  she 
could  say  was  that  he  kept  up  with  his  work.  She 
assumed  that  before  Lemuel's  coming  she  had  been 
the  sole  motive  power  of  the  house ;  but  it  was 
really  a  sort  of  democracy,  and  was  managed  by  the 
majority  of  its  inmates.  An  element  of  demagoguery 
tampered  with  the  Irish  vote  in  the  person  of  Jerry, 


230  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

nominally  porter,  but  actually  factotum,  who  had 
hitherto,  pending  the  strikes  of  the  different  function 
aries,  filled  the  offices  now  united  in  Lemuel.  He 
had  never  been  clerk,  because  his  literature  went  no 
further  than  the  ability  to  write  his  name,  and  to 
read  a  passage  of  the  constitution  in  qualifying  for 
the  suffrage.  He  did  not  like  the  new  order  of  things, 
but  he  was  without  a  party,  and  helpless  to  do  more 
than  neglect  the  gong-bell  when  he  had  reason  to 
think  Lemuel  had  sounded  it. 

About  eleven  o'clock  the  law-student  came  in  with 
the  two  girl  art-students,  fresh  from  the  outside  air, 
and  gay  from  the  opera  they  had  been  hearing.  The 
young  man  told  Lemuel  he  ought  to  go  to  see  it.  After 
the  girls  had  opened  their  door,  one  of  them  came 
running  back  to  the  elevator,  and  called  down  to 
Lemuel  that  there  was  no  ice-water,  and  would  he 
please  send  some  up. 

Lemuel  brought  it  up  himself,  and  when  he 
knocked  at  the  door,  the  same  girl  opened  it  and 
made  a  pretty  outcry  over  the  trouble  she  had  given 
him.  "  I  supposed,  of  course,  Jerry  would  bring  it," 
she  said  contritely ;  and  as  if  for  some  atonement, 
she  added,  "Won't  you  come  in,  Mr.  Barker,  and 
see  my  picture  1 " 

Lemuel  stood  in  the  gush  of  the  gas-light 
hesitating,  and  the  law-student  called  out  to  him, 
jollily,  "  Come  in,  Mr.  Barker,  and  help  me  play  art- 
critic."  He  was  standing  before  the  picture,  with 
his  overcoat  on  and  his  hat  in  his  hand.  "  First 
appearance  on  any  stage,"  he  added ;  and  as  Lemuel 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     231 

entered,  "If  I  were  you,"  he  said,  "I'd  fire  that 
porter  out  of  the  hotel.  He's  outlived  his  useful 
ness." 

"  It 's  a  shame,  your  having  to  bring  the  water," 
said  Miss  Swan ;  she  was  the  girl  who  had  spoken 
before. 

The  other  one  came  forward  and  said,  "Won't 
you  sit  down  f " 

She  spoke  to  Lemuel ;  the  law-student  answered, 
"  Thank  you  ;  I  don't  care  if  I  do." 

Lemuel  did  not  know  whether  to  stay,  nor  what 
to  say  of  Miss  Swan's  picture,  and  he  thanked  the 
young  lady  and  remained  standing. 

"  0  Jessie,  Jessie,  Jessie  !  "  cried  Miss  Swan. 

The  other  went  to  her,  tranquilly,  as  if  used  to 
such  vehement  appeals. 

"  Just  see  how  my  poor  cow  looks  since  I  painted 
out  that  grass  !  She  hasn't  got  a  leg  to  stand  on  !  " 

The  law-student  did  nothing  but  make  jokes  about 
the  picture.  "  I  think  she  looks  pretty  well  for  a  cow 
that  you  must  have  had  to  study  from  a  milk-can — 
nearest  you  could  come  to  a  cow  in  Boston." 

Miss  Carver,  the  other  young  lady,  ignored  his 
joking,  and  after  some  criticisms  on  the  picture,  left 
him  and  Miss  Swan  to  talk  it  over.  She  talked  to 
Lemuel,  and  asked  him  if  he  had  read  a  book  he 
glanced  at  on  the  table,  and  seemed  willing  to  make 
him  feel  at  ease.  But  she  did  not.  He  thought  she 
was  very  proud,  and  he  believed  she  wanted  him  to 
go,  but  he  did  not  know  how  to  go.  Her  eyes  were 
so  still  and  pure  ;  but  they  dwelt  very  coldly  upon 


232  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE. 

him.  Her  voice  was  like  that  look  put  into  sound  ; 
it  was  rather  high-pitched  but  very  sweet  and  pure, 
and  cold.  He  hardly  knew  what  he  said ;  he  felt 
hot,  and  he  waited  for  some  chance  to  get  away. 

At  last  he  heard  Miss  Swan  saying,  "  Must  you  go, 
Mr.  Berry  1  So  soon ! "  and  saw  her  giving  the 
student  her  hand,  with  a  bow  of  burlesque  desolation. 

Lemuel  prepared  to  go  too.  All  his  rusticity  came 
back  upon  him,  and  he  said,  "Well,  I  wish  you 
good  evening." 

It  seemed  to  him  that  Miss  Carver's  still  eyes 
looked  a  sort  of  starry  scorn  after  him.  He  found 
that  -he  had  brought  away  the  book  they  had  been 
talking  about,  and  he  was  a  long  time  in  question 
whether  he  had  better  take  it  back  at  once,  or  give 
it  to  her  when  she  came  to  breakfast. 

He  went  to  bed  in  the  same  trouble  of  mind. 
Every  night  he  had  fallen  asleep  with  Statira  in  his 
thoughts,  but  now  it  was  Miss  Carver  that  he  thought 
of,  and  more  and  more  uncomfortably.  He  asked 
himself  what  she  would  say  if  she  saw  his  mother 
in  the  bloomers.  She  was  herself  not  dressed  so 
fashionably  as  Statira,  but  very  nicely. 


XVII. 

AT  Sewell's  house  the  maid  told  Evans  to  walk  up 
into  the  study,  without  seating  him  first  in  the 
reception-room,  as  if  that  were  needless  with  so 
intimate  a  friend  of  the  family.  He  found  Sewell 
at  his  desk,  and  he  began  at  once,  without  the  forms 
of  greeting : 

"  If  you  don't  like  that  other  subject,  I  've  got  a 
new  one  for  you,  and  you  could  write  a  sermon  on 
it  that  would  make  talk." 

"You  look  at  it  from  the  newspaper  point  of 
view,"  returned  Sewell,  in  the  same  humour.  "  I  'm 
not  an  *  enterprise/  and  I  don't  want  to  make  talk 
in  your  sense.  I  don't  know  that  I  want  to  make 
talk  at  all ;  I  should  prefer  to  make  thought,  to  make 
feeling." 

"Well,"  said  the  editor,  "this  would  do  all 
three." 

"Would  you  come  to  hear  me,  if  I  wrote  the 
sermon  ]  " 

"  Ah,  that 's  asking  a  good  deal." 

"  Why  don't  you  develop  your  idea  in  an  article  ? 
You  're  always  bragging  that  you  preach  to  a  larger 
congregation  than  I." 

233 


234  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"  I  propose  to  let'  you  preach  to  my  congregation 
too,  if  you  '11  write  this  sermon.  I  've  talked  to  you 
before  about  reporting  your  sermons  in  Saturday 
Afternoon.  They  would  be  a  feature  ;  and  if  we 
could  open  with  this  one,  and  have  a  good  '  incisive  ' 
editorial  on  it,  disputing  some  of  your  positions, 
and  treating  certain  others  with  a  little  satire,  at 
the  same  time  maintaining  a  very  respectful  atti 
tude  towards  you  on  the  whole,  and  calling  attention 
to  the  fact  that  there  was  a  strong  and  increasing 
interest  in  your  'utterances/  which  we  were  the 
first  to  recognise, — it  would  be  a  card.  We  might 
agree  beforehand  on  the  points  the  editorial  was  to 
touch,  and  so  make  one  hand  wash  another.  See  ?  " 

"  I  see  that  journalism  has  eaten  into  your  soul. 
What  is  your  subject  ?  " 

"  Well,  in  general  terms,  and  in  a  single  word, 
Complicity.  Don't  you  think  that  would  be  rather 
taking  1  '  Mr.  Sewell,  in  his  striking  sermon  on 
Complicity,'  and  so  forth.  It  would  be  a  great  hit, ' 
and  it  would  stand  a  chance  of  sticking,  like 
Emerson's  '  Compensation.' " 

"  Delightful !  The  most  amusing  part  is  that  you  Ve 
really  a  grain  of  business  in  your  bushel  of  chaff." 
Sewell  wheeled  about  in  his  swivel-chair,  and  sat 
facing  his  guest,  deeply  sunken  in  the  low  easy  seat 
he  always  took.  "  When  did  this  famous  idea  occur 
to  you  1  "  he  pursued,  swinging  his  glasses  by  their 
cord. 

"  About  three  weeks  ago,  at  the  theatre.  There 
was  one  of  those  pieces  on  that  make  you  despair 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  235 

of  the  stage,  and  ashamed  of  writing  a  play  even  to 
be  rejected  by  it — a  farrago  of  indecently  amusing 
innuendoes  and  laughably  vile  situations,  such  as, 
if  they  were  put  into  a  book,  would  prevent  its 
being  sent  through  the  mail.  The  theatre  apparently 
can  still  be  as  filthy  in  suggestion  as  it  was  at  the 
Restoration,  and  not  shock  its  audiences.  There 
were  all  sorts  of  people  there  that  night :  young  girls 
who  had  come  with  young  men  for  an  evening's 
polite  amusement ;  families  ;  middle-aged  husbands 
and  wives  ;  respectable-looking  single  women ;  and 
average  bachelors.  I  don't  think  the  ordinary  thea 
trical  audience  is  of  a  high  grade  intellectually  ;  it 's 
third  or  fourth  rate ;  but  morally  it  seems  quite  as 
good  as  other  public  assemblages.  All  the  people 
were  nicely  dressed,  and  they  sat  there  before  that 
nasty  mess — it  was  an  English  comedy  where  all  the 
jokes  turn  upon  the  belief  of  the  characters  that 
their  wives  and  husbands  are  the  parents  of  illegi 
timate  offspring — and  listened  with  as  smooth  self- 
satisfaction  as  if  they  were  not  responsible  for  it. 
But  all  at  once  it  occurred  to  me  that  they  were 
responsible,  every  one  of  them — as  responsible  as 
the  players,  as  the  author  himself." 

"  Did  you  come  out  of  the  theatre  at  that  point  1 " 
asked  Sewell. 

"  Oh,  I  was  responsible  too  ;  but  I  seemed  to  be 
the  only  one  ashamed  of  my  share  in  the  business." 

"  If  you  were  the  only  one  conscious  of  it,  your 
merit  wasn't  very  great,"  suggested  the  minister. 

"Well,  I  should  like  the  others  to  be  conscious 


236  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

of  it  too.  That 's  why  I  want  you  to  preach  my 
sermon.  I  want  you  to  tell  your  people  and  my 
people  that  the  one  who  buys  sin  or  shame,  or 
corruption  of  any  sort,  is  as  guilty  as  the  one  who 
sells  it." 

"  It  isn't  a  new  theory,"  said  Sewell,  still  refusing 
to  give  up  his  ironical  tone.  "It  was  discovered 
some  time  ago  that  this  was  so  before  God." 

"  Well,  I  've  just  discovered  that  it  ought  to  be  so 
before  man,"  said  Evans. 

"  Still  you  're  not  the  first,"  said  Sewell. 

"  Yes,"  said  the  editor,  "  I  think  I  am,  from  my 
peculiar  standpoint.  The  other  day  a  friend  of 
mine — an  upright,  just,  worthy  man,  no  one  more 
so — was  telling  me  of  a  shocking  instance  of  our 
national  corruption.  He  had  just  got  home  from 
Europe,  and  he  had  brought  a  lot  of  dutiable  things, 
that  a  customs  inspector  passed  for  a  trifling  sum. 
That  was  all  very  well,  but  the  inspector  afterwards 
came  round  with  a  confidential  claim  for  a  hundred 
dollars,  and  the  figures  to  show  that  the  legal 
duties  would  have  been  eight  or  ten  times  as  much. 
My  friend  was  glad  to  pay  the  hundred  dollars ;  but 
he  defied  me  to  name  any  country  in  Europe  where 
such  a  piece  of  official  rascality  was  possible.  He 
said  it  made  him  ashamed  of  America  ! "  Evans 
leaned  his  head  back  against  his  chair  and  laughed. 

"Yes,"  said  Sewell  with  a  sigh,  and  no  longer 
feigning  lightness.  "That's  awful." 

"Well,  now,"  said  Evans,  "don't  you  think  it 
your  duty  to  help  people  realise  that  they  can't 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     237 

regard  such  transactions  de  haut  en  bas,  if  they 
happen  to  have  taken  part  in  them  ?  I  have  heard 
of  the  shameful  condition  of  things  down  in  Maine, 
where  I  'm  told  the  French  Canadians  who  've  come 
in  regularly  expect  to  sell  their  votes  to  the  highest 
bidder  at  every  election.  Since  my  new  system  of 
ethics  occurred  to  me,  I  've  fancied  that  there  must 
have  always  been  a  shameful  state  of  things  there, 
if  Americans  could  grow  up  in  the  willingness  to 
buy  votes.  I  want  to  have  people  recognise  that 
there  is  no  superiority  for  them  in  such  an  affair; 
that  there 's  nothing  but  inferiority  ;  that  the  man 
who  has  the  money  and  the  wit  to  corrupt  is  a  far 
baser  rascal  than  the  man  who  has  the  ignorance 
and  the  poverty  to  be  corrupted.  I  would  make 
this  principle  seek  out  every  weak  spot,  every  sore 
spot  in  the  whole  social  constitution.  I  'm  sick  to 
death  of  the  frauds  that  we  practise  upon  ourselves 
in  order  to  be  able  to  injure  others.  Just  consider 
the  infernal  ease  of  mind  in  which  men  remain  con 
cerning  men's  share  in  the  social  evil — 

"Ah,  my  dear  friend,  you  can't  expect  me  to 
consider  that  in  my  pulpit ! "  cried  the  minister 

"  No ;  I  couldn't  consider  it  in  my  paper.  I 
suppose  we  must  leave  that  where  it  is,  unless  we 
can  affect  it  by  analogy,  and  show  that  there  is 
infamy  for  both  parties  to  any  sin  committed  in 
common.  You  must  select  your  instances  in  other 
directions,  but  you  can  find  plenty  of  them — enough 
and  to  spare.  It  would  give  the  series  a  tremendous 
send-off,"  said  Evans,  relapsing  into  his  habitual 


238  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

tone,  "if  you  would  tackle  this  subject  in  your 
first  sermon  for  publication.  There  would  be  money 
in  it.  The  thing  would  make  a  success  in  the 
paper,  and  you  could  get  somebody  to  reprint  it 
in  pamphlet  form.  Come,  what  do  you  say  1 " 

"I  should  say  that  you  had  just  been  doing 
something  you  were  ashamed  of,"  answered  Sewell. 
"  People  don't  have  these  tremendous  moral  awaken 
ings  for  nothing." 

"  And  you  don't  think  my  present  state  of  mind 
is  a  gradual  outgrowth  of  my  first  consciousness  of 
the  common  responsibility  of  actors  and  audience  in 
the  representation  of  a  shameless  comedy  1 " 

"  No,  I  shouldn't  think  it  was,"  said  the  minister 
securely. 

"  Well  you  're  right."  Evans  twisted  himself 
about  in  his  chair,  and  hung  his  legs  over  one  of 
the  arms. 

"  The  real  reason  why  I  wish  you  to  preach  this 
sermon  is  because  I  have  just  been  offering  a  fee  to 
the  head-waiter  at  our  hotel." 

"  And  you  feel  degraded  with  him  by  his  accept 
ance  1  For  it  is  a  degradation." 

"No,  that's  the  strangest  thing  about  it.  I  have 
a  monopoly  of  the  degradation,  for  he  didn't  take 
my  dollar." 

"Ah,  then  a  sermon  won't  help  you!  Why 
wouldn't  he  take  it  1  " 

"He  said  he  didn't  know  as  he  wanted  any 
money  he  hadn't  earned,"  said  Evans,  with  a  touch 
of  mimicry. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     239 

The  minister  started  up  from  his  lounging  attitude. 
"  Is  his  name — Barker  1  "  he  asked,  with  unerring 
prescience. 

"Yes,"  said  Evans  with  a  little  surprise.  "Do 
you  know  him  ?  " 

"  Yes,"  returned  the  minister,  falling  back  in  his 
chair  helplessly,  not  luxuriously.  "  So  well  that  I 
knew  it  was  he  almost  as  soon  as  you  came  into  the 
room  to-night." 

"  What  harm  have  you  been  doing  him  ? "  demanded 
the  editor,  in  parody  of  the  minister's  acuteness  in 
guessing  the  guilty  operation  of  his  own  mind. 

"  The  greatest.  I  'm  the  cause  of  his  being  in 
Boston." 

"  This  is  very  interesting,"  said  Evans.  "  We  are 
companions  in  crime — pals.  It 's  a  great  honour. 
But  what  strikes  me  as  being  so  interesting  is  that 
we  appear  to  feel  remorse  for  our  misdeeds ;  and  I 
was  almost  persuaded  the  other  day  by  an  observer 
of  our  species,  that  remorse  had  gone  out,  or  rather 
had  never  existed,  except  in  the  fancy  of  innocent 
people  ;  that  real  criminals  like  ourselves  were  afraid 
of  being  found  out,  but  weren't  in  the  least  sorry. 
Perhaps,  if  we  are  sorry,  it  proves  that  we  needn't 
be.  Let 's  judge  each  other.  I  ;ve  told  you  what 
my  sin  against  Barker  is,  and  I  know  yours  in 
general  terms.  It 's  a  fearful  thing  to  be  the  cause 
of  a  human  soul 's  presence  in  Boston ;  but  what 
did  you  do  to  bring  it  about1?  Who  is  Barker? 
Where  did  he  come  from  ?  What  was  his  previous 
condition  of  servitude  ?  He  puzzles  me  a  good  deal." 


240  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"  Oh,  I  '11  tell  you,"  said  Sewell ;  and  he  gave  his 
personal  chapter  in  Lemuel's  history. 

Evans  interrupted  him  at  one  point.  "And 
what  became  of  the  poem  he  brought  down  with 
him  ?  " 

"  It  was  stolen  out  of  his  pocket,  one  night  when 
he  slept  in  the  common." 

"  Ah,  then  he  can't  offer  it  to  me  !  And  he  seems 
very  far  from  writing  any  more.  I  can  still  keep 
his  acquaintance.  Go  on." 

Sewell  told,  in  amusing  detail,  of  the  Wayfarer's 
Lodge,  where  he  had  found  Barker  after  supposing 
he  had  gone  home.  Evans  seemed  more  interested 
in  the  place  than  in  the  minister's  meeting  with 
Lemuel  there,  which  Sewell  fancied  he  had  painted 
rather  well,  describing  Lemuel's  severity  and  his 
own  anxiety. 

"  There  !  "  said  the  editor.  "  There  you  have  it — 
a  practical  illustration  !  Our  civilisation'  has  had  to 
come  to  it  !  " 

"  Come  to  what  1 " 

"  Complicity." 

Sewell  made  an  impatient  gesture. 

"Don't  sacrifice  the  consideration  of  a  great 
principle,"  cried  Evans,  "to  the  petty  effect  of  a 
good  story  on  an  appreciative  listener.  I  realise 
your  predicament.  But  don't  you  see  that  in  estab 
lishing  and  regulating  a  place  like  that  the  city  of 
Boston  has  instinctively  sanctioned  my  idea  1  You 
may  say  that  it  is  aiding  and  abetting  the  tramp-nui 
sance  by  giving  vagrants  food  and  shelter,  but  other 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  241 

philosophers  will  contend  that  it  is — blindly  per 
haps — fulfilling  the  destiny  of  the  future  State,  which 
will  at  once  employ  and  support  all  its  citizens  ; 
that  it  is  prophetically  recognising  my  new  principle 
of  Complicity  1  " 

"  Your  new  principle  ! "  cried  Sewell.  "  You 
have  merely  given  a  new  name  to  one  of  the  oldest 
principles  in  the  moral  world." 

"  And  that  is  a  good  deal  to  do,  I  can  tell  you," 
said  Evans.  "All  the  principles  are  pretty  old  now. 
But  don't  give  way  to  an  ignoble  resentment  of  my 
interruption.  Go  on  about  Barker." 

After  some  feints  that  there  was  nothing  more 
important  to  tell,  Sewell  went  on  to  the  end ;  and 
when  he  had  come  to  it,  Evans  shook  his  head. 
"  It  looks  pretty  black  for  you,  but  it 's  a  beautifully 
perfect  case  of  Complicity.  What  do  you  propose 
to  do,  now  you  've  rediscovered  him  ?  " 

"  Oh,  I  don't  know  !  I  hope  no  more  mischief. 
If  I  could  only  get  him  back  on  his  farm  !  " 

"Yes,  I  suppose  that  would  be  the  best  thing. 
But  I  dare  say  he  wouldn't  go  back !  " 

"  That 's  been  my  experience  with  him." 

They  talked  this  aspect  of  the  case  over  more 
fully,  and  Evans  said :  "  Well,  I  wouldn't  go  back  to 
such  a  place  myself  after  I  'cl  once  had  a  glimpse  of 
Boston,  but  I  suppose  it 's  right  to  wish  that  Barker 
would.  I  hope  his  mother  will  come  to  visit  him 
while  he  's  in  the  hotel.  I  would  give  a  good  deal 
to  see  her.  Fancy  her  coming  down  in  her  bloomers, 
and  the  poor  fellow  being  ashamed  of  her  1  It  would 
Q 


242  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

be  a  very  good  subject  for  a  play.  Does  she  wear  a 
hat  or  a  bonnet  ?  What  sort  of  head-gear  goes  with 
that  '  sleek  odalisque  '  style  of  dress  1  A  turban,  I 
suppose." 

"  Mrs.  Barker,"  said  the  minister,  unable  to  deny 
himself  the  fleeting  comfort  of  the  editor's  humorous 
view  of  the  situation,  "  is  as  far  from  a  'sleek 
odalisque '  as  any  lady  I  Jve  ever  seen,  in  spite  of  her 
oriental  costume.  If  I  remember,  her  yashmak  was 
not  gathered  at  the  ankles,  but  hung  loose  like 
occidental  trousers ;  and  the  day  we  met  she  wore 
simply  her  own  hair.  There  was  not  much  of  it 
on  top,  and  she  had  it  cut  short  in  the  neck.  She 
was  rather  a  terrible  figure.  Her  having  ever  been 
married  would  have  been  inconceivable,  except  for 
her  son." 

"I  should  like  to  have  seen  her,"  said  Evans, 
laughing  back  in  his  chair. 

"  She  was  worth  seeing  as  a  survival  of  the  super 
ficial  fermentation  of  the  period  of  our  social  history 
when  it  was  believed  that  women  could  be  like  men 
if  they  chose,  and  ought  to  be  if  they  ever  meant  to 
show  their  natural  superiority.  But  she  was  not 
picturesque." 

"  The  son  's  very  handsome.  I  can  see  that  the 
lady  boarders  think  him  so." 

"  Do  you  find  him  at  all  remarkable  otherwise  ? 
What  dismayed  me  more  than  his  poetry  even  was 
that  when  he  gave  that  up  he  seemed  to  have  no 
particular  direction." 

"  Oh,  he  reads  a  good  deal,   and  pretty  serious 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     243 

books  j  and  he  goes  to  hear  all  the  sermons  and 
lectures  in  town." 

"  I  thought  he  came  to  mine  only,"  sighed  the 
minister,  with  a  retrospective  suffering.  "  Well, 
what  can  be  done  for  him  now  ?  I  feel  my  complicity 
with  Barker  as  poignantly  as  you  could  wish." 

"  Ah,  you  see  how  the  principle  applies  every 
where  ! "  cried  the  editor  joyously.  He  added  :  "  But 
I  really  think  that  for  the  present  you  can't  do  better 
than  let  Barker  alone.  He  's  getting  on  very  well  at 
Mrs.  Harmon's,  and  although  the  conditions  at  the 
St.  Albans  are  more  'transitory  than  most  sublunary 
things,  Barker  appears  to  be  a  fixture.  Our  little 
system  has  begun  to  revolve  round  him  unconsciously  ; 
he  keeps  us  going." 

"  Well,"  said  Sewell,  consenting  to  be  a  little  com 
forted.  He  was  about  to  go  more  particularly  into 
the  facts ;  but  Mrs.  Sewell  came  in  just  then,  and 
he  obviously  left  the  subject. 

Evans  did  not  sit  down  again  after  rising  to  greet 
her ;  and  presently  he  said  good  night. 

She  turned  to  her  husband :  "  What  were  you 
talking  about  when  I  came  in  I  " 

"  When  you  came  in  1 " 

"  Yes.  You  both  had  that  look — I  can  always  tell 
it — of  having  suddenly  stopped." 

"  Oh  ! "  said  Sewell,  pretending  to  arrange  the 
tilings  on  his  desk.  "  Evans  had  been  suggesting 
the  subject  for  a  sermon."  He  paused  a  moment,  and 
then  he  continued  hardily,  "  And  he  'd  been  telling 
me  about— Barker.  He 's  turned  up  again." 


244  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"Of  course!"  said  Mrs.  Sewell.  ''What's 
happened  to  him  now  1  " 

"  Nothing,  apparently,  but  some  repeated  strokes 
of  prosperity.  He  has  become  clerk,  elevator-boy, 
and  head-waiter  at  the  St.  Albans." 

"  And  what  are  you  going  to  do  about  him  1 " 

"Evans  advises  me  to  do  nothing." 

"Well,  that's  sensible,  at  any  rate,"  said  Mrs. 
Sewell.  "  I  really  think  you  've  done  quite  enough, 
David,  and  now  he  can  be  left  to  manage  for  himself, 
especially  as  he  seems  to  be  doing  well." 

"  Oh,  he 's  doing  as  well  as  I  could  hope,  and 
better.  But  I  'm  not  sure  that  I  shouldn't  have  per 
sonally  preferred  a  continued  course  of  calamity  for 
him.  I  shall  never  be  quite  at  peace  about  him  till 
I  get  him  back  on  his  farm  at  Willoughby  Pastures." 

"  Well,  that  you  will  never  do ;  and  you  may  as 
well  rest  easy  about  it." 

"  I  don't  know  as  to  never  doing  it,"  said  Sewell. 
"  All  prosperity,  especially  the  prosperity  connected 
with  Mrs.  Harmon's  hotel,  is  transitory ;  and  I  may 
succeed  yet." 

"Does  everything  go  on  there  in  the  old  way, 
does  Mr.  Evans  say  1 "  Mrs.  Sewell  did  not  refer  to 
any  former  knowledge  of  the  St.  Albans,  but  to  a 
remote  acquaintance  with  the  character  and  methods 
of  Mrs.  Harmon,  with  whom  the  Sewells  had  once 
boarded.  She  was  then  freshly  widowed  by  the  loss 
of  her  first  husband,  and  had  launched  her  earliest 
boarding-house  on  that  sea  of  disaster,  where  she 
had  buoyantly  outridden  every  storm  and  had 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     245 

floated  triumphantly  on  the  top  of  every  ingulfing 
wave.  They  recalled  the  difficult  navigation  of  that 
primitive  craft,  in  which  each  of  the  boarders  had 
taken  a  hand  at  the  helm,  and  their  reminiscences  of 
her  financial  embarrassments  were  mixed  with  those 
of  the  unfailing  serenity  that  seemed  not  to  know 
defeat,  and  with  fond  memories  of  her  goodness  of 
heart,  and  her  ideal  devotion  in  any  case  of  sickness 
or  trouble. 

"  I  should  think  the  prosperity  of  Mrs.  Harmon 
would  convince  the  most  negative  of  agnostics  that 
there  was  an  overruling  Providence,  if  nothing  else 
did,"  said  Sewell.  "It's  so  defiant  of  all  law,  so 
delightfully  independent  of  causation/' 

"  Well,  let  Barker  alone  with  her,  then,"  said  his 
wife,  rising  to  leave  him  to  the  hours  of  late  read 
ing  which  she  had  never  been  able  to  break  up. 


XVIII. 

AFTER  agreeing  with  his  wife  that  he  had  better 
1  eave  Barker  alone,  Sewell  did  not  feel  easy  in  doing 
so.  He  had  that  ten-dollar  note  which  Miss  Vane 
had  given  him,  and  though  he  did  not  believe,  since 
Evans  had  reported  Barker's  refusal  of  his  fee,  that 
the  boy  would  take  it,  he  was  still  constrained  to  do 
something  with  it.  Before  giving  it  back  to  her,  he 
decided  at  least  to  see  Barker  and  learn  about  his 
prospects  and  expectations.  He  might  find  some 
way  of  making  himself  useful  to  him. 

In  a  state  of  independence  he  found  Lemuel 
much  more  accessible  than  formerly,  and  their  inter 
view  was  more  nearly  amicable.  Sewell  said  that  he 
had  been  delighted  to  hear  of  Lemuel's  whereabouts 
from  his  old  friend  Evans,  and  to  know  that  they 
were  housed  together.  He  said  that  he  used  to 
know  Mrs.  Harmon  long  ago,  and  that  she  was  a 
good-hearted,  well-meaning  woman,  though  without 
much  forecast.  He  even  assented  to  Lemuel's  hasty 
generalisation  of  her  as  a  perfect  lady,  though  they 
both  felt  a  certain  inaccuracy  in  this,  and  Sewell 
repeated  that  she  was  a  woman  of  excellent  heart 
and  turned  to  a  more  intimate  inquest  of  Lemuel's  life. 

246 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     247 

He  tried  "to  find  out  how  he  employed  his  leisure 
time,  saying  that  he  always  sympathised  with  young 
men  away  from  home,  and  suggesting  the  reading- 
room  and  the  frequent  lectures  at  the  Young  Men's 
Christian  Union  for  his  odd  moments.  He  learned 
that  Lemuel  had  not  many  of  these  during  the 
week,  and  that  on  Sundays  he  spent  all  the  time  he 
could  get  in  hearing  the  different  noted  ministers. 
For  the  rest,  he  learned  that  Lemuel  was  very  much 
interested  in  the  city,  and  appeared  to  be  rapidly 
absorbing  both  its  present  civilisation  and  its  past 
history.  He  was  unsmilingly  amused  at  the  com 
ments  of  mixed  shrewdness  and  crudity  which 
Lemuel  was  betrayed  into  at  times  beyond  certain 
limits  of  diffidence  that  he  had  apparently  set  him 
self  ;  at  his  blunders  and  misconceptions,  at  the 
truth  divined  by  the  very  innocence  of  his  youth 
and  inexperience.  He  found  out  that  Lemuel  had 
not  been  at  home  since  he  came  to  Boston  ;  he  had 
expected  to  go  at  Thanksgiving,  but  it  came  so  soon 
after  he  had  got  his  place  that  he  hated  to  ask; 
the  folks  were  all  well,  and  he  would  send  the  kind 
remembrances  which  the  minister  asked  him  to  give 
his  mother.  Sewell  tried  to  find  out,  in  saying  that 
Mrs.  Sewell  and  himself  would  always  be  glad  to  see 
him,  whether  Lemuel  had  any  social  life  outside  of 
the  St.  Albans,  but  here  he  was  sensible  that  a  door 
was  shut  against  him ;  and  finally  he  had  not  the 
courage  to  do  more  about  that  money  from  Miss 
Vane  than  to  say  that  from  time  to  time  he  had 
sums  intrusted  him,  and  that  if  Lemuel  had  any 


248  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

pressing  need  of  money  he  must  borrow  of  him. 
He  fancied  he  had  managed  that  rather  delicately, 
for  Lemuel  thanked  him  without  severity,  and  said 
he  should  get  along  now,  he  guessed,  but  he  was 
much  obliged.  Neither  of  them  mentioned  Miss 
Vane,  and  upon  the  whole  the  minister  was  not  sure 
that  he  had  got  much  nearer  the  boy,  after  all. 

Certainly  he  formed  no  adequate  idea  of  the 
avidity  and  thoroughness  with  which  Lemuel  was 
learning  his  Boston.  It  was  wholly  a  Public  Boston 
which  unfolded  itself  during  the  winter  to  his  eager 
curiosity,  and  he  knew  nothing  of  the  social  in 
tricacies  of  which  it  seems  solely  to  consist  for  so 
many  of  us.  To  him  Boston  society  was  represented 
by  the  coteries  of  homeless  sojourners  in  the  St. 
.Albans;  Boston  life  was  transacted  by  the  ministers, 
the  lecturers,  the  public  meetings,  the  concerts,  the 
horse-cars,  the  policemen,  the  shop-windows,  the 
newspapers,  the  theatres,  the  ships  at  the  docks,  the 
historical  landmarks,  the  charity  apparatus. 

The  effect  was  a  ferment  in  his  mind  in  which 
there  was  nothing  clear.  It  seemed  to  him  that  he 
had  to  change  his  opinions  every  day.  He  was 
whirled  round  and  round ;  he  never  saw  the  same 
object  twice  the  same.  He  did  not  know  whether  he 
learned  or  unlearned  most.  With  the  pride  that  comes 
to  youth  from  the  mere  novelty  of  its  experiences  was 
mixed  a  shame  for  his  former  ignorance,  an  exaspera 
tion  at  his  inability  to  grasp  their  whole  meaning. 

His  activities  in  acquainting  himself  with  Boston 
interested  Evans,  who  tried  to  learn  just  what  his 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     249 

impression  was ;  but  this  was  the  last  thing  that 
Lemuel  could  have  distinctly  imparted. 

"Well,  upon  the  whole,"  he  asked,  one  day, 
"  what  do  you  think  1  From  what  you  Ve  seen  of  it, 
which  is  the  better  place,  Boston  or  Willonghby 
Pastures-?  If  you  were  friendless  and  homeless, 
would  you  rather  be  cast  away  in  the  city  or  in  the 
country  ? " 

Lemuel  did  not  hesitate  about  this.  "In  the  city! 
They  haven't  got  any  idea  in  the  country  what's 
done  to  help  folks  along  in  the  city  !  " 

"  Is  that  so  1 "  asked  Evans.  "  It 's  against  tradi 
tion,"  he  suggested. 

"Yes,  I  know  that,"  Lemuel  assented.  "And  in 
the  country  they  think  the  city  is  a  place  where 
nobody  cares  for  you,  and  everybody  is  against  you, 
and  wants  to  impose  upon  you.  Well,  when  I  first 
came  to  Boston,"  he  continued  with  a  consciousness 
of  things  that  Evans  did  not  betray  his  own  know 
ledge  of,  "  I  thought  so  too,  and  I  had  a  pretty  hard 
time  for  a  while.  It  don't  seem  as  if  people  did  care 
for  you,  except  to  make  something  out  of  you ;  but 
if  any  one  happens  to  find  out  that  you  're  in  trouble, 
there 's  ten  times  as  much  done  for  you  in  the  city 
as  there  is  in  the  country." 

"Perhaps  that's  because  there  are  ten  times  as 
many  to  do  it,"  said  Evans,  in  the  hope  of  provoking 
this  impartial  spirit  further. 

"  No,  it  isn't  that  altogether.  It  7s  because  they  Ve 
seen  ten  times  as  much  trouble,  and  know  how  to 
take  hold  of  it  better.  I  think  our  folks  in  the 


250  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

country  have  been  flattered  up  too  much.  If  some 
of  them  could  come  down  here  and  see  how  thinsrs 

O 

are  carried  on,  they  would  be  surprised.  They 
wouldn't  believe  it  if  you  told  them." 

"I  didn't  know  we  were  so  exemplary,"  said 
Evans. 

"  Oh,  city  folks  have  their  faults  too,"  said  Lemuel, 
smiling  in  recognition  of  the  irony. 

"  No  !     What  1 " 

Lemuel  seemed  uncertain  whether  to  say  it. 
"Well,  they're  too  aristocratic." 

Evans  enjoyed  this  frank  simplicity.  He  pro 
fessed  not  to  understand,  and  begged  Lemuel  to 
explain. 

"  Well,  at  home,  in  the  country,  they  mightn't 
want  to  do  so  much  for  you,  or  be  so  polite  about  it, 
but  they  wouldn't  feel  themselves  so  much  above 
you.  They're  more  on  an  equality.  If  I  needed 
help,  I  'd  rather  be  in  town  ;  but  if  I  could  help  my 
self,  I'd  just  as  soon  be  in  the  country.  Only," 
he  added,  "  there  are  more  chances  here." 

"  Yes,  there  are  more  chances.  And  do  you  think 
it 's  better  not  to  be  quite  so  kind,  and  to  be  more  on 
an  equality  1 " 

"  Why,  don't  you  1  "  demanded  Lemuel. 

"Well,  I  don't  know,"  said  Evans,  with  a  whim 
sical  affection  of  seriousness.  "  Shouldn't  you  like 
an  aristocracy  if  you  could  be  one  of  the  aristocrats  1 
Don't  you  think  you  're  opposed  to  aristocracy 
because  you  don't  want  to  be  under  1  I  have  spoken 
to  be  a  duke  when  we  ge^t  an  order  of  nobility,  and 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  251 

I  find  that  it 's  a  great  relief.  I  don't  feel  obliged  to 
go  in  for  equality  nearly  as  much  as  I  used." 

Lemuel  shyly  dropped  the  subject,  not  feeling 
himself  able  to  cope  with  his  elder  in  these  railleries. 
He  always  felt  his  heaviness  and  clumsiness  in 
talking  with  the  editor,  who  fascinated  him.  He 
did  not  know  but  he  had  said  too  much  about  city 
people  being  aristocratic.  It  was  not  quite  what 
he  meant ;  he  had  really  been  thinking  of  Miss 
Carver,  and  how  proud  she  was,  when  he  said  it. 

Lately  he  had  seemed  to  see  a  difference  between 
himself  and  other  people,  and  he  had  begun  to  look 
for  it  everywhere,  though  when  he  spoke  to  Evans 
he  was  not  aware  how  strongly  the  poison  was  work 
ing  in  him.  It  was  as  if  the  girl  had  made  that 
difference ;  she  made  it  again,  whatever  it  was,  be 
tween  herself  and  the  black  man  who  once  brought 
her  a  note  and  a  bunch  of  flowers  from  one  of  her 
young  lady  pupils.  She  was  very  polite  to  him, 
trying  to  put  him  at  ease,  just  as  she  had  been  with 
Lemuel  that  night.  If  he  came  into  the  dining-room 
to  seat  a  transient  when  Miss  Carver  was  there,  he 
knew  that  she  was  mentally  making  a  difference 
between  him  and  the  boarders.  The  ladies  all  had 
the  custom  of  bidding  him  good  morning  when 
they  came  in  to  breakfast,  and  they  all  smiled  upon 
him  except  Miss  Carver  ;  she  seemed  every  morning 
as  if  more  surprised  to  see  him  standing  there  at  the 
door  and  showing  people  to  their  places  :  she  looked 
puzzled,  and  sometimes  she  blushed,  as  if  she  were 
ashamed  for  him. 


252  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

He  had  discovered,  in  fine,  thais  there  were  sorts  of 
honest  work  in  the  world  which  one  must  not  do  if 
he  would  keep  his  self-respect  through  the  consider 
ation  of  others.  Once  all  work  had  been  work,  but 
now  he  had  found  that  there  was  work  which  was 
service,  and  that  service  was  dishonour.  He  had 
learned  that  the  people  who  did  this  work  were  as  a 
class  apart,  and  were  spoken  of  as  servants,  with 
slight  that  was  unconscious  or  conscious,  but  never 
absent. 

Some  of  the  ladies  at  the  St.  Albans  had  tried  to 
argue  with  Lemuel  about  his  not  taking  the  fees  he 
refused,  and  he  knew  that  they  talked  him  over. 
One  day,  when  he  was  showing  a  room  to  a  transient, 
he  heard  one  of  them  say  to  another  in  the  next 
apartment,  "  Well,  I  did  hate  to  offer  it  to  him,  just 
as  if  he  was  a  common  servant ; "  and  the  other  said, 
"  Well,  I  don't  see  what  he  can  expect  if  he  puts 
himself  in  the  place  of  a  servant."  And  then  they  de 
bated  together  whether  his  quality  of  clerk  was  suffi 
cient  to  redeem  him  from  the  reproach  of  servitude  ; 
they  did  not  call  his  running  the  elevator  anything,  be 
cause  a  clerk  might  do  that  in  a  casual  way  without 
loss  of  dignity  ;  they  alleged  other  cases  of  the  kind. 

His  inner  life  became  a  turmoil  of  suspicions,  that 
attached  themselves  to  every  word  spoken  to  him 
by  those  who  must  think  themselves  above  him- 
He  could  see  now  how  far  behind  in  everything 
Willoughby  Pastures  was,  and  how  the  summer  folks 
could  not  help  despising  the  people  that  took  them 
to  board,  and  waited  on  them  like  servants  in  cities. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     253 

He  esteemed  the  boarders  at  the  St.  Albans  in  the 
degree  that  he  thought  them  enlightened  enough  to 
contemn  him  for  his  station  ;  and  he  had  his  own 
ideas  of  how  such  a  person  as  Mr.  Evans  really  felt 
toward  him.  He  felt  toward  him  and  was  interested 
in  his  reading  as  a  person  might  feel  toward  and  be 
interested  in  the  attainments  of  some  anomalous 
animal,  a  learned  pig,  or  something  of  that  kind. 

He  could  look  back,  now,  on  his  life  at  Miss  Vane's, 
and  see  that  he  was  treated  as  a  servant  there, — a 
petted  servant,  but  still  a  servant, — and  that  was 
what  made  that  girl  behave  so  to  him  ;  he  always 
thought  of  Sibyl  as  that  girl. 

He  would  have  thrown  up  his  place  at  once, 
though  he  knew  of  nothing  else  he  could  do ;  he 
would  have  risked  starving  rather  than  keep  it; 
but  he  felt  that  it  was  of  no  use ;  that  the  stain  of 
servitude  was  indelible  ;  that  if  he  were  lifted  to 
the  highest  station,  it  would  not  redeem  him  in 
Miss  Carver's  eyes.  All  this  time  he  had  scarcely 
more  than  spoken  with  her,  to  return  her  good  morn 
ings  at  the  dining-room  door,  or  to  exchange  greetings 
with  her  on  the  stairs,  or  to  receive  some  charge  from 
her  in  going  out,  or  to  answer  some  question  of  hers 
in  coming  in,  as  to  whether  any  of  the  pupils  who 
had  lessons  of  her  had  been  there  in  her  absence. 
He  made  these  interviews  as  brief  as  possible ;  he 
was  as  stiff  and  cold  as  she. 

The  law-student,  whose  full  name  was  Alonzo 
W.  Berry,  had  one  joking  manner  for  all  manner 
of  men  and  women,  and  Lemuel's  suspicion  could 


254  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

not  find  any  offensive  distinction  in  it  toward  him 
self;  but  he  disabled  Berry's  own  gentility  for  that 
reason,  and  easily  learning  much  of  the  law-student's 
wild  past  in  the  West  from  so  eager  an  autobio- 
grapher,  he  could  not  comfort  himself  with  his  friend 
ship.  While  the  student  poured  out  his  autobio 
graphy  without  stint  upon  Lemuel,  his  shyness  only 
deepened  upon  the  boy.  There  were  things  in  his 
life  for  which  he  was  in  equal  fear  of  discovery  : 
his  arrest  and  trial  in  the  police  court,  his  mother's 
queerness,  and  his  servile  condition  at  Miss  Vane's. 
The  thought  that  Mr.  Sewell  knew  about  them  all 
made  him  sometimes  hate  the  minister,  till  he 
reflected  that  he  had  evidently  told  no  one  of  them. 
But  he  was  al ways  trembling  lest  they  should  some 
how  become  known  at  the  St.  Albans ;  and  when 
Berry  was  going  on  about  himself,  his  exploits,  his 
escapes,  his  loves,— chiefly  his  loves, — Lemuel's  soul 
was  sealed  within  him ;  a  vision  of  his  disgraces 
filled  him  with  horror. 

But  in  the  delight  of  talking  about  himself,  Berry 
was  apparently  unaware  that  Lemuel  had  not 
reciprocated  his  confidences.  He  celebrated  his 
familiarity  with  Miss  Swan  and  her  friend,  though 
no  doubt  he  had  the  greater  share  of  the  aquaint- 
ance, — that  was  apt  to  be  the  case  with  him, — and 
from  time  to  time  he  urged  Lemuel  to  come  up  and 
call  on  them  with  him. 

"I  guess  they  don't  want  me  to  call,"  said  Lemuel 
with  feeble  bitterness  at  last,  one  evening  after  an 
elaborate  argument  from  Berry  to  prove  that  Lemuel 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  255 

had  the  time,  and  that  he  just  knew  they  would 
be  glad  to  see  him. 

"Why?"  demanded  Berry,  and  he  tried  to  get 
Lemuel's  reason ;  but  when  Lemuel  had  stated  that 
belief,  he  could  not  have  given  the  reason  for  it  on 
his  death-bed.  Berry  gave  the  conundrum  up  for 
the  time,  but  he  did  not  give  Lemuel  up ;  he  had  an 
increasing  need  of  him  as  he  advanced  in  a  passion 
for  Miss  Swan,  which,  as  he  frankly  prophesied, 
was  bound  to  bring  him  to  the  popping- point  sooner 
or  later ;  he  debated  with  himself  in  Lemuel's  pre 
sence  all  the  best  forms  of  popping,  and  he  said  that 
it  was  simply  worth  a  ranch  to  be  able  to  sing  to  him, 

"  She  's  a  darling, 
She 's  a  daisy, 
She  's  a  dumpling, 
She's  a  lamb," 

and  to  feel  that  he  knew  who  she  was.  He  usually 
sang  this  refrain  to  Lemuel  when  he  came  in  late  at 
night  after  a  little  supper  with  some  of  the  fellows 
that  had  left  traces  of  its  cheer  on  his  bated  breath. 
Once  he  came  downstairs  alone  in  the  elevator,  in 
his  shirt-sleeves  and  stocking-feet,  for  the  purpose  of 
singing  it  after  Lemuel  had  thought  him  in  bed. 

Every  Sunday  afternoon  during  the  winter 
Lemuel  went  to  see  Statira,  and  sometimes  in  the 
evening  he  took  her  to  church.  But  she  could  not 
understand  why  he  always  wanted  to  go  to  a  differ 
ent  church  ;  she  did  not  see  why  he  should  not  pick 
out  one  church  and  stick  to  it  :  the  ministers  seemed 
to  be  all  alike,  and  she  guessed  one  was  pretty  near 


256  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

as  good  as  another.  'Manda  Grier  said  she  guessed 
they  were  all  Lemuel  to  her ;  and  Statira  said  well, 
she  guessed  that  was  pretty  much  so.  She  no  longer 
pretended  that  he  was  not  the  whole  world  to  her, 
either  with  him  or  with  'Manda  Grier ;  she  was  so 
happy  from  morning  till  night,  day  in  and  day  out, 
that  'Manda  Grier  said  if  she  were  in  her  place  she 
should  be  afraid  something  would  happen. 

Statira  worked  in  the  box-factory  now ;  she  liked 
it  a  great  deal  better  than  the  store,  and  declared 
that  she  was  ever  so  much  stronger.  The  cough 
lingered  still,  but  none  of  them  noticed  it  much;  she 
called  it  a  cold,  and  said  she  kept  catching  more. 
'Manda  Grier  told  her  that  she  could  throw  it  oft 
soon  enough  if  she  would  buy  a  few  clothes  for 
warmth  and  not  so  many  for  looks ;  but  they  did 
not  talk  this  over  before  Lemuel.  Before  he  came 
Statira  took  a  soothing  mixture  that  she  got  of  the 
apothecary,  and  then  they  were  all  as  bright  and  gay 
as  could  be,  and  she  looked  so  pretty  that  he  said 
he  could  not  get  used  to  it.  The  housekeeping 
experiment  was  a  great  success;  she  and  'Manda 
Grier  had  two  rooms  now,  arid  they  lived  better  than 
ever  they  had,  for  less  money.  Of  course,  Statira 
said,  it  was  not  up  to  the  St.  Albans,  which  Lemuel 
had  told  them  of  at  first  a  little  braggingly.  In  fact 
she  liked  to  have  him  brag  of  it,  and  of  the  splendours 
of  his  position  and  surroundings.  She  was  very 
curious,  but  not  envious  of  anything,  and  it  became 
a  joke  with  her  and  'Manda  Grier,  who  pretended 
to  despise  the  whole  affair. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     257 

At  first  it  flattered  Lemuel  to  have  her  admire 
his  rise  in  life  so  simply  and  ardently;  but  after  a  while 
it  became  embarrassing,  in  proportion  as  it  no  longer 
seemed  so  superb  to  him.  She  was  always  wanting 
him  to  talk  of  it ;  after  a  few  Sundays,  with  the 
long  hours  they  had  passed  in  telling  each  other  all 
they  could  think  of  about  themselves,  they  had  not 
much  else  to  talk  of.  Now  that  she  had  him  to  employ 
her  fancy,  Statira  no  longer  fed  it  on  the  novels  she 
used  to  devour.  He  brought  her  books,  but  she  did 
not  read  them;  she  said  that  she  had  been  so  busy  with 
her  sewing  she  had  no  time  to  read;  and  every  week 
she  showed  him  some  pretty  new  thing  she  had  been 
making,  and  tried  it  on  for  him  to  see  how  she  looked 
in  it.  Often  she  seemed  to  care  more  to  rest  with 
her  head  on  his  shoulder,  and  not  talk  at  all ;  and  for 
a  while  this  was  enough  for  him  too,  though  sometimes 
he  was  disappointed  that  she  did  not  even  let  him 
read  to  her  out  of  the  books  she  neglected.  She 
would  not  talk  over  the  sermons  they  heard  together; 
but  once  when  Mr.  Evans  offered  him  tickets  for  the 
theatre,  and  Lemuel  had  got  the  night  off  and  taken 
Statira,  it  seemed  as  if  she  would  be  willing  to  sit 
up  till  morning  and  talk  the  play  over. 

Nothing  else  ever  interested  her  so  much,  except 
what  one  of  the  girls  in  the  box-factory  had  told 
her  about  going  down  to  the  beach,  summers,  and 
waiting  on  table.  This  girl  had  been  at  Old  Orchard, 
where  they  had  splendid  times,  with  one  veranda  all 
to  themselves  and  the  gentlemen-help ;  and  in  the 
afternoon  the  girls  got  together  on  the  beach — or  the 
R 


258  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

grass  right  in  front  of  the  hotel — and  sewed.  They 
got  nearly  as  much  as  they  did  in ,  the  box-factory ; 
and  then  the  boarders  all  gave  you  something  extra ; 
some  of  them  gave  as  much  as  a  dollar  a  week  apiece. 
The  head-waiter  was  a  college  student,  and  a  perfect 
gentleman ;  he  was  always  dressed  up  in  a  dress- 
suit  and  a  white  silk  neck-tie.  Statira  said  that 
next  summer  she  wanted  they  should  go  off  some 
where,  she  and  'Manda  Grier,  and  wait  on  table 
together  ;  and  she  knew  Lemuel  could  easily  get  the 
head-waiter's  place,  after  the  St.  Albans.  She  should 
not  want  he  should  be  clerk,  because  then  they  could 
not  have  such  good  times,  for  they  would  be  more 
separated. 

Lemuel  heard  her  restively  through,  and  then 
broke  out  fiercely  and  told  her  that  he  had  seen 
enough  of  waiting  on  table  at  the  St.  Albans  for 
him  never  to  want  her  to  do  it ;  and  that  the  boarders 
who  gave  money  to  the  waiters  despised  them  for 
taking  it.  He  said  that  he  did  not  consider  just 
helping  Mrs.  Harmon  out  the  same  as  being  head- 
waiter,  and  that  he  Avould  not  be  a  regular  waiter  for 
any  money  :  he  would  rather  starve. 

Statira  did  not  understand  ;  she  asked  him  meekly 
if  he  were  mad  at  her,  he  seemed  so ;  and  he  had  to 
do  what  he  could  to  cheer  her  up. 

'Manda  Grier  took  Statira's  part  pretty  sharply. 
She  said  it  was  one  thing  to  live  out  in  a  private 
family — that  icas  a  disgrace,  if  you  could  keep  the 
breath  of  life  in  you  any  other  way — and  it  was 
quite  another  to  wait  in  an  hotel ;  and  she  did  not 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     259 

want  to  have  any  one  hint  round  that  she  would  let 
Statira  demean  herself.  Lemuel  was  offended  by  her 
manner,  and  her  assumption  of  owning  Statira.  She 
defended  him,  but  he  could  not  tell  her  how  he  had 
changed ;  the  influences  were  perhaps  too  obscure 
for  him  to  have  traced  them  all  himself ;  after  the 
first  time  he  had  hardly  mentioned  the  art-student 
girls  to  her.  There  were  a  great  many  things  that 
Statira  could  not  understand.  She  had  been  much 
longer  in  the  city  than  Lemuel,  but  she  did  not  seem 
to  appreciate  the  difference  between  that  and  the 
country.  She  dressed  very  stylishly ;  no  one  went 
beyond  her  in  that ;  but  in  many  things  he  could  see 
that  she  remained  countrified.  Once  on  a  very  mild 
April  evening,  when  they  were  passing  through  the 
Public  Garden,  she  wished  him  to  sit  on  a  vacant 
seat  they  came  to.  All  the  others  were  occupied 
by  young  couples  who  sat  with  their  arms  around 
each  other. 

"No,  no!"  shuddered  Lemuel,  "I  don't  want 
people  should  take  you  for  one  of  these  servant-girls." 

"  Why,  Lem,  how  proud  you  're  getting  ! "  she 
cried  with  easy  acquiescence.  "  You  're  awfully  stuck 
up  !  Well,  then,  you  Ve  got  to  take  a  horse- car ;  I 
can't  walk  any  further." 


XIX. 

LEMUEL  had  found  out  about  the  art-students  from 
Berry.  He  said  they  were  no  relation  to  each  other, 
and  had  not  even  been  acquainted  before  they  met 
at  the  art-school ;  he  had  first  met  them  at  the  St. 
Albans.  Miss  Swan  was  from  the  western  part  of 
the  State,  and  Miss  Carver  from  down  Plymouth 
way.  The  latter  took  pupils,  and  sometimes  gave 
lessons  at  their  houses ;  she  was,  to  Berry's  thinking, 
not  half  the  genius  and  not  half  the  duck  that  Miss 
Swan  was,  though  she  was  a  duck  in  her  way  too. 
Miss  Swan,  as  nearly  as  he  could  explain,  was  study 
ing  art  for  the  fun  of  it,  or  the  excitement,  for  she 
was  well  enough  off;  her  father  was  a  lawyer  out 
there,  and  Berry  believed  that  a  rising  son-in-law  in 
his  own  profession  would  be  just  the  thing  for  the 
old  man's  declining  years.  He  said  he  should  not  be 
very  particular  about  settling  down  to  practice  at 
once;  if  his  wife  wanted  to  go  to  Europe  a  while,  and 
kind  of  tender  foot  it  round  for  a  year  or  two  in  the 
art-centres  over  there,  he  would  let  the  old  man  run 
the  business  a  little  longer ;  sometimes  it  did  an  old 
man  good.  There  was  no  hurry  ;  Berry's  own  father 

260 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     261 

was  not  excited  about  his  going  to  work  right  away ; 
he  had  the  money  to  run  Berry  and  a  wife  too,  if  it 
came  to  that ;  Miss  Swan  understood  that.  He 
had  not  told  her  so  in  just  so  many  words,  but  he 
had  let  her  know  that  Alonzo  W.  Berry,  senior, 
was  not  borrowing  money  at  two  per  cent,  a  month 
any  more.  He  said  he  did  not  care  to  make  much 
of  a  blow  about  that  part  of  it  till  he  was  ready  to 
act,  and  he  was  not  going  to  act  till  he  had  a  dead- 
sure  thing  of  it ;  he  was  having  a  very  good  time 
as  it  went  along,  and  he  guessed  Miss  Swan  was 
too  ;  no  use  to  hurry  a  girl,  when  she  was  on  the 
right  track. 

Berry  invented  these  axioms  apparently  to  put 
himself  in  heart;  in  the  abstract  he  was  already 
courageous  enough.  He  said  that  these  Eastern 
girls  were  not  used  to  having  any  sort  of  attention ; 
that  there  was  only  about  a  tenth  or  fifteenth  of  a 
fellow  to  every  girl,  and  that  it  tickled  one  of  them 
to  death  to  have  a  whole  man  around.  He  was  not 
meanly  exultant  at  their  destitution.  He  said  he 
just  wished  one  of  these  pretty  Boston  girls — nice, 
well  dressed,  cultured,  and  brought  up  to  be  snubbed 
and  neglected  by  the  tenths  and  fifteenths  of  men 
they  had  at  home — could  be  let  loose  in  the  West, 
and  have  a  regular  round-up  of  fellows.  Or,  no,  he 
would  like  to  have  about  five  thousand  fellows  from 
out  there,  that  never  expected  a  woman  to  look  at 
them,  unloaded  in  Boston,  and  see  them  open  their 
eyes.  "Wouldn't  one  of.  'em  get  home  alive,  if 
kindness  could  kill  'em.  I  never  saw  such  a  place  ! 


262  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

I  can't  gefc  used  to  it  !  It  makes  me  tired.  Any 
sort  of  fellow  could  get  married  in  Boston  !" 

Berry  made  no  attempt  to  reconcile  his  uncertainty 
as  to  his  own  chances  with  this  general  theory,  but 
he  urged  it  to  prove  that  Miss  Swan  and  Miss  Carver 
would  like  to  have  Lemuel  call;  he  said  they  had  both 
said  they  wished  they  could  paint  him.  He  had  him 
self  sustained  various  characters  in  costume  for  them, 
and  one  night  he  pretended  that  they  had  sent  him 
down  for  Lemuel  to  help  out  with  a  certain  group. 
But  they  received  him  with  a  sort  of  blankness  which 
convinced  him  that  Berry  had  exceeded  his  authority ; 
there  was  a  helplessness  at  first,  and  then  an  indignant 
determination  to  save  him  from  a  false  position  even 
at  their  own  cost,  which  JLemuel  felt  rather  than  saw. 
Miss  Carver  was  foremost  in  his  rescue  ;  she  devoted 
herself  to  this,  and  left  Miss  Swan  to  punish  Berry, 
who  conveyed  from  time  to  time  his  sense  that  he 
fras  "  getting  it,"  by  a  wink  to  Lemuel. 

An  observer  with  more  social  light  might  have 
been  more  puzzled  to  account  for  Berry's  toleration 
by  these  girls,  who  apparently  associated  with  him 
on  equal  terms.  Since  he  was  not  a  servant,  he  was 
their  equal  in  Lemuel's  eyes  ;  perhaps  his  acceptance 
might  otherwise  be  explained  by  the  fact  that  he  was 
very  amusing,  chivalrously  harmless,  and  extremely 
kind-hearted  and  useful  to  them.  One  must 
not  leave  out  of  the  reckoning  his  open  devotion 
for  Miss  Swan,  which  in  itself  would  do 
much  to  approve  him  to  her,  and  commend  him 
to  Miss  Carver,  if  she  were  a  generous  girl,  and  very 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     263 

fond  of  her  friend.  It  is  certain  that  they  did  tole 
rate  Berry,  who  made  them  laugh  even  that  night 
in  spite  of  themselves,  till  Miss  Swan  said,  "  Well, 
what  '&  the  use  ? "  and  stopped  trying  to  discipline 
him.  After  that  they  had  a  very  sociable  evening, 
though  Lemuel  kept  his  distance,  and  would  not  let 
them  include  him,  knowing  what  the  two  girls  really 
thought  of  him.  He  would  not  take  part  in  Berry's 
buffooneries,  but  talked  soberly  and  rather  austerely 
with  Miss  Carver;  and  to  show  that  he  did  not  feel 
himself  an  inferior,  whatever  she  might  think,  he  was 
very  sarcastic  about  some  of  the  city  ways  and  customs 
they  spoke  of.  There  were  a  good  many  books  about 
— novels  mostly,  but  not  the  kind  Statira  used  to 
read,  and  poems ;  Miss  Carver  said  she  liked  to  take 
them  up  when  she  was  nervous  from  her  work;  and  if 
the  weather  was  bad,  and  she  could  not  get  out  for  a 
walk,  a  book  seemed  to  do  her  almost  as  much  good. 
Nearly  all  the  pictures  about  in  the  room  seemed  to 
be  Miss  Swan's  ;  in  fact,  when  Lemuel  asked  about 
them,  and  tried  to  praise  them  in  such  a  way  as  not 
to  show  his  ignorance,  Miss  Carver  said  she  did  very 
little  in  colour ;  her  lessons  were  all  in  black  and 
white.  He  would  not  let  her  see  that  he  did  not 
know  what  this  was,  but  he  was  ashamed,  and  he 
determined  to  find  out;  he  determined  to  get  a 
drawing-book,  and  learn  something  about  it  himself. 
To  his  thinking,  the  room  was  pretty  harum-scarum. 
There  were  shawls  hung  upon  the  walls,  and  rugs, 
and  pieces  of  cloth,  which  sometimes  had  half-finished 
paintings  fastened  to  them ;  there  were  paintings 


264  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

standing  round  the  room  on  the  floor,  sometimes  right 
side  out,  and  sometimes  faced  to  the  walls;  there  were 
two  or  three  fleeces  and  fox-pelts  scattered  about  in 
stead  of  a  carpet;  and  there  were  two  easels,  and 
stands  with  paints  all  twisted  up  in  lead  tubes  on 
them.  He  compared  the  room  with  Statira's,  and 
did  not  think  much  of  it  at  first. 

Afterwards  it  did  not  seem  so  bad  :  he  began  to 
feel  its  picturesqueness,  for  he  went  there  again,  and 
let  the  girls  sketch  him.  When  Miss  Swan  asked 
him  that  night  if  he  would  let  them  he  wished  to 
refuse ;  but  she  seemed  so  modest  about  it,  and 
made  it  such  a  great  favour  on  his  part,  that  he  con 
sented  ;  she  said  she  merely  wished  to  make  a  little 
sketch  in  colour,  and  Miss  Carver  a  little  study  of  his 
head  in  black  and  white ;  and  he  imagined  it  a 
trifling  affair  that  could  be  despatched  "in  a  single 
night.  They  decided  to  treat  his  head  as  a  Young 
Eoman  head;  and  at  the  end  of  a  long  sitting, 
beguiled  with  talk  and  with  thoughtful  voluntaries 
from  Berry  on  his  banjo,  he  found  that  Miss  Carver 
had  rubbed  her  study  nearly  all  out  with  a  piece  of 
bread,  and  Miss  Swan  said  she  should  want  to  try 
a  perfectly  new  sketch  with  the  shoulders  draped  ; 
the  coat  had  confused  her ;  she  would  not  let  any 
one  see  what  she  had  done,  though  Berry  tried  to 
make  her  let  him. 

Lemuel  looked  a  little  blank  when  she  asked  him 
for  another  sitting ;  but  Berry  said,  "  Oh,  you  '11  have 
to  come,  Barker.  Penalty  of  greatness,  you  know. 
Have  you  in  Williams  &  Everett's  window ;  notices 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  265 

in  all  the  papers.  '  The  exquisite  studies,  by  Miss 
Swan  and  Miss  Carver,  of  the  head  of  the  gentle 
manly  and  accommodating  clerk  of  the  St.  Albans, 
as  a  Koman  Youth.'  Chromoed  as  a  Christmas  card 
by  Prang,  and  photograph  copies  everywhere. 
You're  all  right,  Barker." 

One  night  Miss  Swan  said,  in  rapture  with  some 
momentary  success,  "  Oh,  I  'm  perfectly  in  love  with 
this  head  ! " 

Berry  looked  up  from  his  banjo,  which  he  ceased 
to  strum.  "  Hello,  hello,  lael-lo  /  " 

Then  the  two  broke  into  a  laugh,  in  which 
Lemuel  helplessly  joined. 

"  What — what  is  it  1  "  asked  Miss  Carver,  looking 
up  absently  from  her  work. 

"  Nothing ;  just  a  little  outburst  of  passion  from 
our  young  friend  here,"  said  Berry,  nodding  his  head 
toward  Miss  Swan. 

"  What  does  it  mean,  Mad  1 "  asked  Miss  Carver 
in  the  same  dreamy  way,  continuing  her  work. 

"Yes,  Madeline,"  said  Berry,  "explain  your 
self." 

"  Mr.  Berry  !  "  cried  Miss  Swan  warningly. 

"  That 's  me  ;  Alonzo  W.,  Jr.    Go  on  ! " 

"  You  forget  yourself,"  said  the  girl,  with  imperfect 
severity. 

"Well,  you  forgot  me  first,"  said  Berry,  with 
affected  injury.  "  Ain't  it  hard  enough  to  sit  here 
night  after  night,  strumming  on  the  old  banjo,  while 
another  fellow  is  going  down  to  posterity  as  a  Roman 
Youth  with  •&  red  shawl  round  his  neck,  without 


266  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

having  to  hear  people  say  they  're  in  love  with  that 
head  of  his  ? " 

Miss  Carver  now  stopped  her  work,  and  looked 
from  her  friend,  with  her  head  bowed  in  laughter 
on  the  back  of  her  hand,  to  that  of  Berry  bent  in 
burlesque  reproach  upon  her,  and  then  at  Lemuel, 
who  was  trying  to  control  himself. 

"  But  I  can  tell  you  what,  Miss  Swan  ;  you  spoke 
too  late,  as  the  man  said  when  he  swallowed  the 
chicken  in  the  fresh  egg.  Mr.  Barker  has  a  previous 
engagement.  That  so,  Barker  1 " 

Lemuel  turned  fire-red,  and  looked  round  at  Miss 
Carver,  who  met  his  glance  with  her  clear  gaze. 
She  turned  presently  to  make  some  comment  on 
Miss  Swan's  sketch,  and  then,  after  working  a  little 
while  longer,  she  said  she  was  tired,  and  was  going 
to  make  some  tea. 

The  girls  both  pressed  Lemuel  to  stay  for  a  cup, 
but  he  would  not ;  and  Berry  followed  him  down 
stairs  to  explain  and  apologise. 

"It's  all  right,"  said  Lemuel.  "What  difference 
would  it  make  to  them  whether  I  was  engaged  or 
not  ?  " 

"  Well,  I  suppose  as  a  general  rule  a  girl  would 
rather  a  fellow  wasn't,"  philosophised  Berry.  He 
whistled  ruefully,  and  Lemuel  drawing  a  book 
toward  him  in  continued  silence,  he  rose  from  the 
seat  he  had  taken  on  the  desk  in  the  little  office,  and 
said,  "  Well,  I  guess  it  '11  all  come  out  right.  Come 
to  think  of  it,  /  don't  know  anything  about  your 
affairs,  and  I  can  tell  'em  so." 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER,  267 

"Oh,  it  don't  matter." 

.  He  had  pulled  the  book  toward  him  as  if  he  were 
going  to  read,  but  he  could  not  read ;  his  head  was 
in  a  whirl.  After  a  first  frenzy  of  resentment  against 
Berry,  he  was  now  angry  at  himself  for  having  been 
so  embarrassed.  He  thought  of  a  retort  that  would 
have  passed  it  all  off  lightly ;  then  he  reflected  again 
that  it  was  of  no  consequence  to  these  young  ladies 
whether  he  was  engaged  or  not,  and  at  any  rate  it 
was  nobody's  business  but  his  own.  Of  course  he 
was  engaged  to  Statira,  but  he  had  hardly  thought  of 
it  in  that  way.  'Manda  Grier  had  joked  about  the 
time  when  she  supposed  she  should  have  to  keep  old 
maid's  hall  alone  ;  when  she  first  did  this  Lemuel 
thought  it  delightful,  but  afterwards  he  did  not  like 
it  so  much  ;  it  began  to  annoy  him  that  'Manda  Grier 
should  mix  herself  up  so  much  with  Statira  and 
himself.  He  believed,  that  Statira  would  be  different, 
would  be  more  like  other  ladies  (he  generalised  it  in 
this  way,  but  he  meant  Miss  Swan  and  Miss  Carver), 
if  she  had  not  'Manda  Grier  there  all  the  time  to 
keep  her  back.  He  convinced  himself  that  if  it  were 
not  for  'Manda  Grier,  he  should  have  had  no  trouble 
in  telling  Statira  that  the  art- students  were  sketch 
ing  him ;  and  that  he  had  not  done  so  yet  because 
he  hated  to  have  'Manda  ask  her  so  much  about  them, 
and  call  them  that  Swan  girl  and  that  Carver  girl,  as 
she  would  be  sure  to  do,  and  clip  away  the  whole 
evening  with  her  questions  and  her  guesses.  It  was 
now  nearly  a  fortnight  since  the  sketching  began, 
and  he  had  let  one  Sunday  night  pass  without 


268  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

mentioning  it.  He  could  not  let  another  pass,  and 
he  knew  'Manda  Grier  would  say  they  were  a  good- 
while  about  it,  and  would  show  her  ignorance,  and 
put  Statira  up  to  asking  all  sorts  of  things.  He  could 
not  bear  to  think  of  it,  and  he  let  the  next  Sunday 
night  pass  without  saying  anything  to  Statira.  The 
sittings  continued  ;  but  before  the  third  Sunday  came 
Miss  Swan  said  she  did  not  see  how  she  could  do 
anything  more  to  her  sketch,  and  Miss  Carver  had 
already  completed  her  study.  They  criticised  each 
other's  work  with  freedom  and  good  humour,  and 
agreed  that  the  next  thing  was  to  paint  it  out  and 
rub  it  out. 

"  No,5'  said  Berry ;  "  what  you  want  is  a  fresh  eye 
on  it.  I  Ve  worried  over  it  as  much  as  you  have, — 
suffered  more,  I  believe, — and  Barker  can't  tell 
whether  he  looks  like  a  Roman  Youth  or  not.  "Why 
don't  you  have  up  old  Evans  1 " 

Miss  Swan  took  no  apparent  notice  of  this 
suggestion ;  and  Miss  Carver,  who  left  Berry's 
snubbing  entirely  to  her,  said  nothing.  After  a 
minute's  study  of  the  pictures,  Miss  Swan  sug 
gested,  "If  Mr.  Barker  had  any  friends  he  would 
like  to  show  them  to  1 " 

"Oh  no,  thank  you,"  returned  Lemuel  hastily, 
"there  isn't  anybody,"  and  again  he  found  himself 
turning  very  red. 

"Well,  I  don't  know  how  we  can  thank  you 
enough  for  your  patience,  Mr.  Barker,"  said  the  girl. 

"  Oh,  don't  mention  it.  I  Ve — I  've  enjoyed  it," 
said  Lemuel. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     269 

"Game — every  time,"  said  Berry;  and  their 
evening  broke  up  with  a  laugh. 

The  next  morning  Lemuel  stopped  Miss  Swan  at 
the  door  of  the  breakfast  room,  and  said,  "  I  Jve  been 
thinking  over  what  you  said  last  night,  and  I  should 
like  to  bring  some  one — a  lady  friend  of  mine — to 
see  the  pictures." 

"  Why,  certainly,  Mr.  Barker.  Any  time.  Some 
evening  1 "  she  suggested. 

"  Should  you  mind  it  if  I  came  to-morrow  night  ?  " 
be  asked ;  and  he  thought  it  right  to  remind  her, 
"  it 's  Sunday  night." 

"  Oh,  not  at  all !  To-morrow  night,  by  all  means  ! 
We  shall  both  be  at  home,  and  very  glad  to  see  you." 
She  hurried  after  Miss  Carver,  loitering  on  her  way 
to  their  table,  and  Lemuel  saw  them  put  their  heads 
together,  as  if  they  were  whispering.  He  knew 
they  were  whispering  about  him,  but  they  did  not 
laugh ;  probably  they  kept  themselves  from  laughing. 
In  coming  out  from  breakfast,  Miss  Swan  said,  "I 
hope  your  friend  isn't  very  critical,  Mr.  Barker  ? " 
and  he  answered  confusedly,  "  Oh,  not  at  all,  thank 
you."  But  he  said  to  himself  that  he  did  not  care 
whether  she  was  trying  to  make  fun  of  him  or 
not,  he  knew  what  he  had  made  up  his  mind  to 
do. 

Statira  did  not  seem  to  care  much  about  going 
to  see  the  pictures,  when  he  proposed  it  to  her 
the  next  evening.  She  asked  why  he  had  been 
keeping  it  such  a  great  secret,  and  he  could  not 
pretend,  as  he  had  once  thought  he  could,  that 


\ 


270  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

he  was  keeping  it  as  a  surprise  for  her.  "  Should 
you  like  to  see  'em,  'Manda  1 "  she  asked,  with 
languid  indifference. 

"  I  d'  know  as  I  care  much  about  Lem's  picture, 
s'long  's  we  Ve  got  him  around,"  'Manda  Grier 
whipped  out,  "  but  I  should  like  t'  see  those  celebrated 
girls  't  we  've  heard  s'  much  about." 

"Well,"  said  Statira  carelessly,  and  they  went 
into  the  next  room  to  put  on  their  wraps.  Lemuel, 
vexed  to  have  'Manda  Grier  made  one  of  the  party, 
and  helpless  to  prevent  her  going,  walked  up  and 
down,  wondering  what  he  should  say  when  he 
arrived  with  this  unexpected  guest. 

But  Miss  Swan  received  both  of  the  girls  very 
politely,  and  chatted  with  'Manda  Grier,  whose  con 
versation,  in  defiance  of  any  sense  of  superiority 
that  the  Swan  girl  or  the  Carver  girl  might  feel, 
was  a  succession  of  laconic  snaps,  sometimes  witty, 
but  mostly  rude  and  contradictory. 

Miss  Carver  made  tea,  and  served  it  in  some 
pretty  cups  which  Lemuel  hoped  Statira  might 
admire,  but  she  took  it  without  noticing,  and  in 
talking  with  Miss  Carver  she  drawled,  and  said 
"  N-y-e-e-e-s,"  and  "  I  don't  know  as  I  d-o-o-o,"  and 
"  Well,  I  should  think  as  m-u-u-ch,"  with  a  prolonga 
tion  of  all  the  final  syllables  in  her  sentences  which 
he  had  not  observed  in  her  before,  and  which  she 
must  have  borrowed  for  the  occasion  for  the  gentil 
ity  of  the  effect.  She  tried  to  refer  everything  to 
him,  and  she  and  'Manda  Grier  talked  together  as 
much  as  they  could,  and  when  the  others  spoke  of 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  271 

him  as  Mr.  Barker,  they  called  him  Lem.  They  did 
not  look  at  anything,  or  do  anything  to  betray  that 
they  found  the  studio,  on  which  Lemuel  had 
once  expatiated  to  them,  different  from  other 
rooms. 

At  last  Miss  Swan  abruptly  brought  out  the  studies 
of  Lemuel's  head,  and  put  them  in  a  good  light ; 
'Manda  Grier  and  Statira  got  into  the  wrong  place 
to  see  them. 

'Manda  blurted  out,  "Well,  he  looks  's  if  he'd 
had  a  fit  of  sickness  in  that  one ; "  and  perhaps,  in 
fact,  Miss  Carver  had  refined  too  much  upon  a  deli 
cate  ideal  of  Lemuel's  looks. 

"  So  he  d-o-o-es  !  "  drawled  Statira.  "  And  how 
funny  he  looks  with  that  red  thing  o-o-o-n ! " 

Miss  Swan  explained  that  she  had  thrown  that  in 
for  the  colour,  and  that  they  had  been  fancying  him 
in  the  character  of  a  young  Roman. 

"  You  think  he  's  got  a  Roman  n-o-o-se  ?  "  asked 
Statira  through  her  own. 

"I  think  Lem's  got  a  kind  of  a  pug,  m'self,"  said 
'Manda  Grier. 

"  Well,  'Manda  Grier  ! "  said  Statira. 

Lemuel  could  not  look  at  Miss  Carver,  whom  he 
knew  to  be  gazing  at  the  two  girls  from  the  little 
distance  to  which  she  had  withdrawn ;  Miss  Swan 
was  biting  her  lip. 

"  So  that 's  the  celebrated  St.  Albans,  is  it  ? "  said 
'Manda  Grier,  when  they  got  in  the  street.  "  Don't 
know 's  I  really  ever  expected  to  see  the  inside  'f  it. 


272  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE. 

You  notice  the  kind  of  oilcloth  they  had  on  that 
upper  entry,  S'tira  1  " 

They  did  not  mention  Lemuel's  pictures,  or  the 
artists ;  and  he  scarcely  spoke  on  the  way  home. 

When  they  parted,  Statira  broke  out  crying,  and 
would  not  let  him  kiss  her. 


XX. 


"  I  'M  afraid  your  little  friend  at  the  St.  Albans 
isn't  altogether  happy  of  late,"  said  Evans  toward 
the  end  of  what  he  called  one  of  his  powwows  with 
Sewell.  Their  talk  had  taken  a  vaster  range  than 
usual,  and  they  both  felt  the  need,  that  people  know 
in  dealing  with  abstractions,  of  finally  getting  the 
ground  beneath  their  feet  again. 

"Ah?"  asked  Sewell,  with  a  twinge  that  allayed 
his  satisfaction  in  this.  "  What 's  the  matter  with 
him  3 " 

"  Oh,  the  knowledge  of  good  and  evil,  I  suspect." 

"I  hope  there's  nothing  wrong,"  said  Sewell 
anxiously. 

"Oh  no.  I  used  the  phrase  because  it  came 
easily.  Just  what  I  mean  is  that  I  'm  afraid  his 
view  of  our  social  inequalities  is  widening  and 
deepening,  and  that  he  experiences  the  dissatis 
faction  of  people  who  don't  command  that  prospect 
from  the  summit.  I  told  you  of  his  censure  of  our 
aristocratic  constitution  1 " 

"  Yes,"  said  Sewell,  with  a  smile. 

"  Well,  I  'm  afraid  he  feels  it  more  and  more.  If 
I  can  judge  from  the  occasional  distance  and  hauteur 

s 


274  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

with  which  he  treats  me,  he  is  humiliated  by  it. 
Nothing  makes  a  man  so  proud  as  humiliation,  you 
know." 

"  That 's  true  !  " 

"There  are  a  couple  of  pretty  girls  at  the  St. 
Albans,  art-students,  who  have  been  painting  Barker. 
So  I  learn  from  a  reformed  cow-boy  of  the  plains 
who  is  with  us  as  a  law-student  and  is  about  with 
one  of  the  young  ladies  a  good  deal.  They  're 
rather  nice  girls ;  quite  nice,  in  fact ;  and  there 's  no 
harm  in  the  cow-boy,  and  a  good  deal  of  fun.  But 
if  Barker  had  conceived  of  being  painted  as  a  social 
inferior,  and  had  been  made  to  feel  that  he  was 
merely  a  model ;  and  if  he  had  become  at  all  aware 
that  one  of  the  girls  was  rather  pretty — they  both 

are " 

.  "I  see!" 

"  I  don't  say  it 's  so.  But  he  seems  low-spirited. 
Why  don't  you  come  round  and  cheer  him  up — get 
into  his  confidence " 

"  Get  into  the  centre  of  the  earth  !  "  cried  Sewell. 
"  I  never  saw  such  an  inapproachable  creature  !  " 

Evans  laughed.  "  He  is  rather  remote.  The 
genuine  American  youth  is  apt  to  be  so,  especially 
if  he  thinks  you  mean  him  a  kindness.  But  there 
ought  to  be  some  way  of  convincing  him  that  he 
need  not  feel  any  ignominy  in  his  employment. 
After  so  many  centuries  of  Christianity  and  genera 
tions  of  Democracy,  it  ought  to  be  very  simple  to 
convince  him  that  there  is  nothing  disgraceful  in 
showing  people  to  their  places  at  table." 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  275 

"  It  isn't,"  said  the  minister  soberly. 

"  No,  it  isn't,"  said  Evans.  "  I  wonder,"  he  added 
thoughtfully,  "  why  we  despise  certain  occupations  1 
We  don't  despise  a  man  who  hammers  stone  or  saws 
boards ;  why  should  we  despise  a  barber  ?  Is  the 
care  of  the  human  head  intrinsically  less  honourable 
than  the  shaping  of  such  rude  material "?  Why  do  we 
still  contemn  the  tailor  who  clothes  us,  and  honour 
the  painter  who  portrays  us  in  the  same  clothes  1 
Why  do  we  despise  waiters  1  I  tried  to  make 
Barker  believe  that  I  respected  all  kinds  of  honest 
work.  But  I  lied ;  I  despised  him  for  having  waited 
on  table.  Why  have  all  manner  of  domestics  fallen 
under  our  scorn,  and  come  to  be  stigmatised  in  a  lump 
as  servants  1  " 

"Ah,  I  don't  know,"  said  the  minister.  "  There  is 
something  in  personal  attendance  upon  us  that  dis 
honours  ;  but  the  reasons  of  it  are  very  obscure  ;  / 
couldn't  give  them.  Perhaps  it 's  because  it 's  work 
that  in  a  simpler  state  of  things  each  of  us  would  do 
for  himself,  and  in  this  state  is  too  proud  to  do." 

"  That  doesn't  cover  the  whole  ground,"  said 
Evans. 

"  And  you  think  that  poor  boy  is  troubled — is 
really  suffering  from  a  sense  of  inferiority  to  the 
other  young  people  ?  " 

"  Oh,  I  don't  say  certainly.  Perhaps  not.  But  if 
he  were,  what  should  you  say  was  the  best  thing  for 
him  to  do  ?  Remain  a  servant ;  cast  his  lot  with 
these  outcasts;  or  try  to  separate  and  distinguish 
himself  from  them,  as  we  all  do  1  Come ;  we  live  in 


276  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

the  world,  which  isn't  so  bad,  though  it 's  pretty 
stupid.  He  couldn't  change  it.  Now,  what  ought 
he  to  do  ? " 

Sewell  mused  a  while  without  answering  anything. 
Then  he  said  with  a  smile,  "It's  very  much  simpler 
to  fit  people  for  the  other  world  than  for  this,  don't 
you  think  1 " 

"Yes,  it  is.  It  was  a  cold  day  for  the  clergy 
when  it  was  imagined  that  they  ought  to  do  both." 

"  Well,"  said  Sewell,  rising  to  follow  his  friend  to 
the  door,  "  I  will  come  to  see  Barker,  and  try  to  talk 
with  him.  He's  a  very  complicated  problem.  I 
supposed  that  I  had  merely  his  material  prosperity  to 
provide  for,  after  getting  him  down  here,  but  if  I  have 
to  reconcile  him  to  the  constitution  of  society ! " 

"  Yes,"  said  Evans.  "  I  wish  you  'd  let  me  know 
the  result  of  your  labours.  I  think  I  could  make  a 
very  incisive  article  on  the  subject.  The  topic  is 
always  an  attractive  one.  There  is  nobody  who 
doesn't  feel  that  somebody  else  is  taking  on  airs  with 
him,  and  ought  to  have  his  comb  cut.  Or,  if  you 
should  happen  to  prove  to  Barker  that  his  ignominy 
is  in  accordance  with  the  Development  Theory,  and 
is  a  necessary  Survival,  or  something  of  that  sort, 
don't  you  see  what  a  card  it  would  be  for  us  with 
the  better  classes  ?  " 

They  wenf  downstairs  together,  and  at  the  street 
door  Evans  stopped  again.  "Or,  I '11  tell  you  what. 
Make  it  a  simple  study  of  Barker's  mind — a  sort  of 
psychological  interview,  and  then  with  what  I've 
been  able  to  get  from  him  we  can  present  the  im- 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     277 

pression  that  Boston  makes  upon  a  young,  fresh, 
shrewd  mind.  That  would  be  something  rather  new, 
wouldn't  it  ?  Come  !  the  Afternoon  would  make  it 
worth  your  while.  And  then  you  could  work  it 
into  a  sermon  afterwards." 

"  You  shameless  reprobate  ! "  said  Sewell,  laying 
his  hand  affectionately  on  his  friend's  arm. 

There  was  nothing  in  Lemuel's  case  that  seemed 
to  him  urgent,  and  he  did  not  go  to  see  him  at  once. 
In  the  meantime,  Fast  Day  came,  and  Lemuel  got 
away  at  last  to  pay  his  first  visit  home. 

"  Seems  to  me  ye  ain't  lookin'  over  and  above 
well,  Lem,"  was  the  first  thing  his  mother  said  to 
him,  even  before  she  noticed  how  well  he  was 
dressed. 

His  new  spring  overcoat,  another  prize  from  the 
Misfit  Parlours,  and  his  new  pointed-toe  shoes,  and 
Derby  hat,  with  the  suit  of  clothes  he  had  kept  so 
carefully  all  through  the  winter,  were  not  the 
complete  disguise  he  had  fancied  they  might  be  at 
Willoughby  Pastures.  The  depot-master  had  known 
him  as  soon  as  he  got  out  of  the  cars,  and  ignored 
his  splendour  in  recognising  him.  He  said,  "  Hello, 
Lem,"  and  had  not  time  to  reconcile  himself  to  the 
boy's  changed  appearance  before  Lemuel  hurried  away 
with  the  bag  he  had  bought  so  long  before  for  the 
visit.  He  met  several  people  on  his  way  home  from 
the  depot :  two  of  them  were  women,  and  one  of 
these  said  she  knew  as  soon  as  she  looked  at  him 
who  it  was,  and  the  other  said  she  should  have 
known  it  was  Lem  Barker  as  far  as  she  could  see 


278  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

him.      She   asked   him   if   he  was   home    for  good 
now. 

His  mother  pushed  back  his  thick  hair  with  her 
hard  old  hand  as  she  spoke  to  him,  and  then  she 
pressed  his  head  down  upon  her  neck,  which  was 
mostly  collar-bone.  But  Lemuel  .could  hear  her 
heart  beat,  and  the  tears  came  into  his  eyes. 

"  Oh,  I  'm  all  right,  mother,"  he  said  huskily, 
though  he  tried  to  say  it  cheerfully.  He  let  her 
hold  his  head  there  the  longer  because  mixed  with 
his  tenderness  for  her  was  a  horror  of  her  bloomers, 
which  he  was  not  at  once  able  to  overcome.  When 
he  gained  courage  to  look,  he  saw  that  she  had  them 
on,  but  now  he  had  the  strength  to  bear  it. 

"  Ye  had  any  breakfast  ?  "  she  asked,  and  when  he 
said  that  he  had  got  a  cup  of  coffee  at  Fitchburg, 
she  said,  well,  she  must  get  him  something,  and  she 
drew  him  a  cup  of  Japan  tea,  and  made  him  some 
milk  toast  and  picked-fish,  talking  all  the  time,  and 
telling  him  how  his  sister  and  her  husband  had  gone 
to  the  village  to  have  one  of  her  teeth  drawn. 
They  had  got  along  through  the  winter  pretty  well ; 
but  she  guessed  that  they  would  have  had  more  to 
complain  of  if  it  had  not  been  for  him.  This  was  her 
way  of  acknowledging  the  help  Lemuel  had  given 
them  every  week,  and  it  was  casually  sandwiched 
between  an  account  of  an  Indian  Spirit  treatment 
which  Eeuben  had  tried  for  his  rheumatism,  and  a 
question  whether  Lemuel  had  seen  anything  of  that 
Mind  Cure  down  to  Boston. 

But  when  he  looked  about  the  room,  and  saw  here 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     279 

and  there  the  simple  comforts  and  necessaries  which  his 
money  had  bought  the  sick  man  and  the  two  helpless 
women,  his  heart  swelled  with  joy  and  pride ;  and  he 
realised  the  pleasure  we  all  feel  in  being  a  good 
genius.  At  times  it  had  come  pretty  hard  to  send  the 
greater  part  of  his  week's  wages  home,  but  now  he  was 
glad  he  had  done  it.  The  poor,  coarse  food  which 
his  mother  had  served  him  as  a  treat;  the  low, 
cracked  ceilings ;  the  waving  floor,  covered  with  rag 
carpet ;  the  sagging  doors,  and  the  old-fashioned  trim 
of  the  small-paned  windows,  were  all  very  different 
from  the  luxurious  abundance,  the  tesselated  pave 
ment,  and  the  tapestry  Brussels,  the  lofty  studding, 
and  the  black  walnut  mouldings  of  the  St.  Albans;  and 
Lemuel  felt  the  difference  with  a  curious  mixture  of 
pride  and  remorse  in  his  own  escape  from  the  mean 
ness  of  his  home.  He  felt  the  self-reproach  to  which 
the  man  who  rises  without  raising  with  him  all  those 
dear  to  him  is  destined  in  some  measure  all  his  life. 
His  interests  and  associations  are  separated  from 
theirs,  but  if  he  is  not  an  ignoble  spirit,  the  ties  of 
affection  remain  unweakened ;  he  cares  for  them 
with  a  kind  of  indignant  tenderness,  and  calls  him 
self  to  account  before  them  in  the  midst  of  pleasures 
which  they  cannot  share,  or  even  imagine. 

Lemuel's  mother  did  not  ask  him  much  about 
his  life  in  Boston;  she  had  not  the  materials  for 
curiosity  about  it ;  but  he  told  her  everything  thai) 
he  thought  she  could  understand.  She  recurred  to 
his  hopes  when  he  left  home  and  their  disappoint 
ment  in  Sewell,  and  she  asked  if  Lemuel  ever  saw 


280  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

him  nowadays.  She  could  not  reconcile  herself  to 
his  reconciliation  with  Sewell,  whom  she  still  held  to 
have  behaved  treacherously.  Then  she  went  back 
to  Lemuel's  looks,  and  asked  him  if  he  kept  pretty 
well;  and,  when  he  answered  that  he  did,  she 
smoothed  with  her  hand  the  knot  between  her  eyes, 
and  did  not  question  him  further. 

He  had  the  whole  forenoon  with  his  mother,  and 
he  helped  her  to  get  the  dinner,  as  he  used  to  do, 
pulling  the  stove-wood  out  of  the  snow-drift  that  still 
embedded  part  of  the  wood-pile,  though  the  snow  was 
all  gone  around  Boston.  It  was  thawing  under  the 
dull,  soft  April  sky,  and  he  saw  the  first  bluebird 
perched  on  the  clothes-line  when  he  went  out  for  the 
wood ;  his  mother  said  there  had  been  lots  of  them. 
He  walked  about  the  place,  and  into  the  barn,  taking 
in  the  forlornness  and  shabbiness ;  and  then  he  went 
up  into  the  room  over  the  shed,  where  he  used  to 
study  and  write.  His  heart  ached  with  self-pity. 

He  realised  as  he  had  not  done  at  a  distance  how 
dependent  this  wretched  home  was  upon  him ;  and 
after  meaning  the  whole  morning  to  tell  his  mother 
about  Statira,  he  decided  that  he  was  keeping  it  from 
her,  not  merely  because  he  was  ashamed  to  tell  her 
that  he  was  engaged,  but  because  it  seemed  such  a 
crazy  thing,  for  a  person  in  his  circumstances,  if  it 
was  really  an  engagement.  He  had  not  seen  Statira 
since  that  night  when  he  brought  her  to  look  at  the 
pictures  the  art-students  had  made  of  him.  He  felt 
that  he  had  not  parted  with  her  kindly,  and  he  went 
to  see  her  the  night  before  he  started  home,  though 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     281 

it  was  not  Sunday,  but  he  had  found  her  door  locked, 
and  this  made  him  angry  with  her,  he  could  not  have 
said  just  why.  If  he  told  his  mother  about  Statira 
now,  what  should  he  tell  her  1  He  compromised  by 
telling  her  about  the  two  girls  that  had  painted  his 
likeness. 

His  mother  seemed  not  to  care  a  great  deal  about 
the  pictures.  She  said,  "I  don't  want  you  should 
let  any  girl  make  a  fool  of  you,  Lem." 

"  Oh  no,"  he  answered,  and  went  and  looked  out 
of  the  window. 

"I  don't  say  but  what  they  're  nice  girls  enough, 
but  in  your  place  you  no  need  to  throw  yourself 
away." 

Lemuel  thought  of  the  awe  of  Miss  Carver  in 
which  he  lived,  and  the  difference  between  them  ; 
and  he  could  have  laughed  at  his  mother's  ignorant 
pride.  What  would  she  say  if  she  knew  that  he 
was  engaged  to  a  girl  that  worked  in  a  box-factory  7 
But  probably  she  would  not  think  that  studying  art 
and  teaching  it  was  any  better.  She  evidently 
believed  that  his  position  in  the  St.  Albans  was 
superior  to  that  of  Miss  Carver. 

His  sister  and  her  husband  came  home  before  they 
had  finished  dinner.  His  sister  had  her  face  all  tied 
up  to  keep  from  taking  cold  after  having  her  tooth 
drawn,  and  Lemuel  had  to  go  out  and  help  his 
rheumatic  brother-in-law  put  up  the  horse.  When 
they  came  in,  his  brother-in-law  did  not  wash  his 
hands  before  going  to  the  table,  and  Lemuel  could 
not  keep  his  eyes  off  his  black  and  broken  finger- 


282          -  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

nails  ;  his  mother's  and  sister's  nails  were  black  too. 
It  must  have  been  so  when  he  lived  at  home. 

His  sister  could  not  eat ;  she  took  some  tea,  and 
went  to  bed.  His  brother-in-law  pulled  off  his  boots 
after  dinner,  and  put  up*  his  stocking-feet  on  the 
stove-hearth  to  warm  them. 

There  was  no  longer  any  chance  to  talk  with  his 
mother  indoors,  and  he  asked  her  if  she  would  not 
like  to  come  out ;  it  was  very  mild.  She  put  on  her 
bonnet,  and  they  strolled  down  the  road.  All  the 
time  Lemuel  had  to  keep  from  looking  at  her 
bloomers.  When  they  met  any  one  driving,  he 
had  to  keep  himself  from  trying  to  look  as  if  he 
were  not  with  her,  but  was  just  out  walking  alone. 

The  day  wore  heavily  away.  His  brother-in-law's 
rheumatism  came  on  toward  evening,  and  his  sister's 
face  had  swollen,  so  that  it  would  not  do  for  her  to 
go  out.  Lemuel  put  on  some  old  clothes  he  found  in 
his  room,  and  milked  the  cows  himself. 

"Like  old  times,  Lem,"  said  his  mother,  when  he 
came  in. 

"  Yes,"  he  assented  quietly. 

He  and  his  mother  had  tea  together,  but  pretty 
soon  afterwards  she  seemed  to  get  sleepy;  and 
Lemuel  said  he  had  been  up  early  and  he  guessed  he 
would  go  to  bed.  His  mother  said  she  guessed  she 
would  go  too. 

After  he  had  blown  out  his  light,  she  came  in  to 
see  if  he  were  comfortable.  "  I  presume  it  seems  a 
pretty  poor  place  to  you,  Lem,"  she  said,  holding 
her  lamp  up  and  looking  round. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     283 

"I  guess  if  it's  good  enough  for  you  it  is  for 
me,"  he  answered  evasively. 

"  No,  it  ain't,"  she  said.  "  I  always  b'en  used  to 
it,  and  I  can  see  from  your  talk  that  you  've  got  used 
to  something  different  already.  Well,  it 's  right, 
Lem.  You  're  a  good  boy,  and  I  want  you  should 
get  the  good  of  Boston,  all  you  can.  We  don't  any 
of  us  begrutch  it  to  ye  ;  and  what  I  came  up  to  say 
now  was,  don't  you  scrimp  yourself  down  there  to 
send  home  to  us.  We  got  a  roof  over  our  heads, 
and  we  can  keep  soul  and  body  together  somehow ; 
we  always  have,  and  we  don't  need  a  great  deal. 
But  I  want  you  should  keep  yourself  nicely  dressed 
down  to  Boston,  so  't  you  can  go  with  the  best ;  I 
don't  want  you  should  feel  anyways  meechin'  on 
account  of  your  clothes.  You  got  a  good  figure, 
Lem ;  you  take  after  your  father.  Sometimes  I 
wish  you  was  a  little  bigger ;  but  he  wa'n't ;  and  he 
had  a  big  spirit.  He  wa'n't  afraid  of  anything ;  and 
they  said  if  he  'd  come  out  o'  that  battle  where  he 
was  killed,  he  'd  V  b'en  a  captain.  He  was  a  good 
man." 

She  had  hardly  ever  spoken  so  much  of  his  father 
before ;  he  knew  now  by  the  sound  of  her  voice  in 
the  dim  room  that  the  tears  must  be  in  her  eyes  j 
but  she  governed  herself  and  went  on. 

"  What  I  wanted  to  say  was,  don't  you  keep  send- 
in'  so  much  o'  your  money  home,  child.  It 's  yours, 
and  I  want  you  should  have  it ;  most  of  it  goes  for 
patent  medicines,  anyway,  when  it  gets  here ;  we 
can't  keep  Reuben  from  buying  'em,  and  he 's  always 


284  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

changin'  doctors.  And  I  want  you  should  hold 
yourself  high,  Lem.  You  're  as  good  as  anybody. 
And  don't  you  go  with  any  girls,  especially,  that 
ain't  of  the  best.  You  're  gettin'  to  that  time  o'  life 
when  you  '11  begin  to  think  about  'em ;  but  don't  you 
go  and  fall  in  love  with  the  first  little  poppet  you  see, 
because  she 's  got  pretty  eyes  and  curly  hair." 

It  seemed  to  Lemuel  as  if  she  must  know  about 
Statira,  but  of  course  she  did  not.  He  lay  still,  and 
she  went  on. 

"Don't  you  go  and  get  engaged,  or  any  such 
foolishness  in  a  hurry,  Lem.  Them  art-student 
girls  you  was  tellin'  about,  I  presume  they're  all 
right  enough ;  but  you  wait  a  while.  Young  men 
think  it 's  a  kind  of  miracle  if  a  girl  likes  'em,  and 
they  're  ready  to  go  crazy  over  it ;  but  it 's  the  most 
natural  thing  she  can  do.  You  just  wait  a  while. 
When  you  get  along  a  little  further,  you  can  pick  and 
choose  for  yourself.  I  don't  know  as  I  should  want  you 
should  marry  for  money ;  but  don't  you  go  and  take 
up  with  the  first  thing  comes  along,  because  you're 
afraid  to  look  higher.  What 's  become  o'  that  nasty 
thing  that  talked  so  to  you  at  that  Miss  Vane's?" 

Lemuel  said  that  he  had  never  seen  Sibyl  or  Miss 
Vane  since ;  but  he  did  not  make  any  direct 
response  to  the  anxieties  his  mother  had  hinted  at. 
Her  pride  in  him,  so  ignorant  of  all  the  reality  of 
his  life  in  the  city,  crushed  him  more  than  the  sight 
and  renewed  sense  of  the  mean  conditions  from  which 
he  had  sprung.  What  if  he  should  tell  her  that  Miss 
Carver,  whom  she  did  not  want  him  to  marry  in  a 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     285 

hurry,  regarded  him  as  a  servant,  and  treated  him 
as  she  would  treat  a  black  man  1  What  if  she  knew 
that  he  was  as  good  as  engaged  to  marry  a  girl  that 
could  no  more  meet  Miss  Carver  on  the  same  level 
than  she  could  fly  ?  He  could  only  tell  his  mother 
not  to  feel  troubled  about  him ;  that  he  was  not 
going  to  get  married  in  any  great  hurry;  and 
pretend  to  be  sleepy  and  turn  his  head  away. 

She  pulled  the  covering  up  round  his  neck  and 
tucked  it  in  with  her  strong,  rough  old  hand,  whose 
very  tenderness  hurt. 

He  had  expected  to  stay  the  greater  part  of  the 
next  day,  but  he  took  an  earlier  train.  His  sister 
was  still  laid  up ;  she  thought  she  must  have  taken 
cold  in  her  jaw;  her  husband,  rumpled,  unshaven, 
with  a  shawl  over  his  shoulders,  cowered  about  the 
cook-stove  for  the  heat.  He  began  to  hate  this 
poverty  and  suffering,  to  long  for  escape  from  it  to 
the  life  which  at  that  distance  seemed  so  rich  and 
easy  and  pleasant ;  he  trembled  lest  something  might 
haive  happened  in  his  absence  to  have  thrown  him 
out  of  his  place. 

All  the  way  to  Boston  he  was  under  the  misery  of 
the  home  that  he  was  leaving;  his  mother's  pride 
added  to  the  burden  of  it.  But  when  the  train  drew 
in  sight  of  the  city,  and  he  saw  the  steeples  and 
chimneys,  and  the  thin  masts  of  the  ships  printed 
together  against  the  horizon,  his  heart  rose.  He  felt 
equal  to  it,  to  anything  in  it. 

He  arrived  in  the  middle  of  the  afternoon,  and  he 
saw  no  one  at  the  hotel  except  the  Harmons  till 


286  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

toward  dinner-time.  Then  the  ladies  coming  in  from 
shopping  had  a  word  of  welcome  for  him ;  some  of 
them  stopped  and  shook  hands  at  the  office,  and 
when  they  began  to  come  down  to  dinner  they  spoke 
to  him,  and  there  again  some  of  them  offered  their 
hands ;  they  said  it  seemed  an  age  since  he  had  gone. 

The  art-students  came  down  with  Berry,  who 
shook  hands  so  cordially  with  him  that  perhaps  they 
could  not  help  it.  Miss  Carver  seemed  to  hesitate, 
but  she  gave  him  her  hand  too,  and  she  asked,  as 
the  others  had  done,  whether  he  had  found  his 
family  well. 

He  did  not  know  what  to  think.  Sometimes  he 
felt  as  if  people  were  trying  to  make  a  fool  of  him 
almost.  He  remained  blushing  and  smiling  to 
himself  after  the  last  of  them  had  gone  in  to  dinner. 
He  did  not  know  what  Miss  Carver  meant,  but  her 
eyes  seemed  to  have  lost  that  cold  distance,  and  to 
have  come  nearer  to  him. 

Late  at  night  Berry  came  to  him  where  he  sat  at 
his  desk.  "  Well,  Barker,  I  'm  glad  you  're  back 
again,  old  man.  Feels  as  if  you'd  been  gone  a 
month  of  Sundays.  Didn't  know  whether  we 
should  have  you  with  us  this  first  evening." 

Lemuel  grew  hot  with  consciousness,  and  did  not 
make  it  better  for  himself  by  saying,  "I  don't 
know  what  you  mean." 

"  Well,  I  don't  suppose  /  should  in  your  place" 
returned  Berry.  "  It  Js  human  nature.  It 's  all 
right.  What  did  the  ladies  think  of  the  'Koman 
Youth '  the  other  night  1  The  distinguished  artists 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     287 

weren't  sure  exactly,  and  I  thought  I  could  make 
capital  with  one  of  Jem  if  I  could  find  out.  Yes, 
that's  my  little  game,  Barker;  that's  what  I 
dropped  in  for ;  Bismarck  style  of  diplomacy.  I  '11 
tell  you  why  they  want  to  know,  if  you  won't  give 
me  away :  Miss  Swan  wanted  to  give  her  '  bit  of 
colour' — that's  what  she  calls  it — to  one  of  the 
young  ladies ;  but  she  's  afraid  she  didn't  like  it." 

"  I  guess  they  liked  it  well  enough,"  said  Lemuel, 
thinking  with  shame  that  Statira  had  not  had  the 
grace  to  say  a  word  of  either  of  the  pictures ;  he 
attributed  this  to  'Manda  Grier's  influence. 

"  Well  that 's  good,  so  far  as  it  goes,"  said  Berry. 
"But  now,  to  come  down  to  particulars,  what  did 
they  say  ?  That 's  what  Miss  Swan  will  ask  me" 

"  I  don't  remember  just  what  they  said,"  faltered 
Lemuel. 

"  Well,  they  must  have  said  something,"  insisted 
Berry  jocosely.  "  Give  a  fellow  some  little  clue, 
and  I  can  piece  it  out  for  myself.  What  did  she 
say?  I  don't  ask  which  she  was?  but  I  have  my 
suspicions.  All  I  want  to  know  is  what  she  said. 
Anything  like  beautiful  middle  distance,  or  splendid 
chiaroscuro,  or  fine  perspective,  or  exquisite  model 
ling?  Come  now!  Try  to  think,  Barker."  He 
gave  Lemuel  time,  but  to  no  purpose.  "Well," 
he  resumed,  with  affected  dejection,  "  I  '11  have  to  try 
to  imagine  it ;  I  guess  I  can ;  I  haven't  worked  my 
imagination  much  since  I  took  up  the  law.  But 
look  here,  Barker,"  he  continued  more  briskly, 
"  now  you  open  up  a  little.  Here  I  Ve  been  giving 


288  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

you  my  confidence  ever  since  I  saw  you — forcing  it 
on  you ;  and  you  know  just  how  far  I  'm  gone  on 
Miss  Swan,  to  a  hundredth  part  of  an  inch ;  but  I 
don't  know  enough  of  your  affections  to  swear  that 
you  Ve  got  any.  Now,  which  one  is  it  1  Don't  be 
mean  about  it.  I  won't  give  you  away.  Honest 
Injun  ! " 

Lemuel  was  goaded  to  desperation.  His  face 
burned,  and  the  perspiration  began  to  break  out  on 
his  forehead.  He  did  not  know  how  to  escape  from 
this  pursuit. 

"  Which  is  it,  Barker  ?  "  repeated  his  tormentor. 
"I  know  it's  human  nature  to  deny  it;  though  I 
never  could  understand  why ;  if  I  was  engaged,  the 
Sunday  papers  should  have  it  about  as  quick  ! " 

"  I  'm  not  engaged  !  "  cried  Lemuel. 

"  You  ain't  ? "  yelled  Berry. 

"No!" 

"  Give  me  your  hand  !    Neither  am  I !  " 

He  shook  Lemuel's  helpless  hand  with  mock  heroic 
fervour.  "  We  are  brothers  from  this  time  forth, 
Barker !  You  can't  imagine  how  closely  this  tie 
binds  you  to  me,  Barker.  Barker,  we  are  one ;  with 
no  particular  prospect,  as  far  as  I  am  concerned,  of 
ever  being  more." 

He  offered  to  dramatise  a  burst  of  tears  on 
Lemuel's  shoulder ;  but  Lemuel  escaped  from  him. 

"  Stop  !  Quit  your  fooling  !  What  if  somebody 
should  come  in  1  " 

"They  won't,"  said  Berry,  desisting,  and 
stretching  himself  at  ease  in  the  only  chair  besides 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     289 

Lemuel's  with  which  the  office  was  equipped.  "  It 's 
too  late  for  'em.  Now  o'er  the  one-half  world  nature 
seems  dead-ah,  and  wicked  dreams  abuse  the 
curtained  sleep-ah.  We  are  safe  here  from  all 
intrusion,  and  I  can  lay  bare  my  inmost  thoughts  to 
you,  Barker,  if  I  happen  to  have  any.  Barker, 
I'm  awfully  glad  you're  not  engaged  to  either  of 
those  girls, — or  both.  And  it's  not  altogether 
because  I  enjoy  the  boon  companionship  of  another 
unengaged  man,  but  it's  partly  because  I  don't 
think— shall  I  say  it  1 " 

"Say  what?"  asked  Lemuel,  not  without  some 
prescience. 

"  Well,  you  can  forgive  the  brotherly  frankness, 
if  you  don't  like  it.  I  don't  think  they  're  quite  up 
to  you." 

Lemuel  gave  a  sort  of  start,  which  Berry  in 
terpreted  in  his  own  way. 

"  Now,  hold  on !  I  know  just  how  you  feel. 
Been  there  myself.  I  have  seen  the  time  too  when 
I  thought  any  sort  of  girl  was  too  good  for  Alonzo 
W.,  Jr.  But  I  don't  now.  I  think  A.  W.,  Jr., 
is  good  enough  for  the  best.  I  may  be  mistaken ; 
I  was  the  other  time.  But  we  all  begin  that  way ; 
and  the  great  object  is  not  to  keep  on  that  way. 
See  1  Now,  I  suppose  you  're  in  love — puppy  love— 
with  that  little  thing.  Probably  the  first  girl  you 
got  acquainted  with  after  you  came  to  Boston,  or 
may  be  a  sweet  survival  of  the  Willoughby  Pastures 
period.  All  right.  Perfectly  natural,  in  either  case. 
But  don't  you  let  it  go  any  further,  my  dear  boy ; 
T 


290  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

old  man,  don't  you  let  it  go  any  further.  Pause ! 
Reflect !  Consider  !  Love  wisely,  but  not  too  well ! 
Take  the  unsolicited  advice  of  a  sufferer." 

Pride,  joy,  shame,  remorse,  mixed  in  Lemuel's 
heart,  which  eased  itself  in  an  involuntary  laugh 
at  Berry's  nonsense. 

"Now,  what  I  want  you  to  do — dear  boy,  or  old 
man,  as  the  case  may  be — is  to  regard  yourself  in 
a  new  light.  Regard  yourself,  for  the  sake  of  the 
experiment,  as  too  good  for  any  girl  in  Boston. 
No  ]  Can't  fetch  it  ?  Try  again  ! " 

Lemuel  could  only  laugh  foolishly. 

"Well,  now,  that's  singular,"  pursued  Berry.  "I 
supposed  you  could  have  done  it  without  the  least 
trouble.  Well,  let's  try  something  a  little  less 
difficult.  Look  me  in  the  eye,  and  regard  yourself 
as  too  good,  for  example,  for  Miss  Carver.  Ha  ! " 

An  angry  flush  spread  over  Lemuel's  embarrassed 
face.  "  I  wish  you  'd  behave  yourself,"  he  stammered. 

"In  any  other  cause  I  would,"  said  Berry 
solemnly.  "But  I  must  be  cruel  to  be  kind. 
Seriously,  old  man,  if  you  can't  think  yourself  too 
good  for  Miss  Carver,  I  wish  you  'd  think  yourself 
good  enough.  Now,  I'm  not  saying  anything 
against  the  Willoughby  episode,  mind.  That  has 
its  place  in  the  wise  economy  of  nature,  just  like 
anything  else.  But  there  ain't  any  outcome  in  it 
for  you.  You  Ve  got  a  future  before  you,  Barker, 
and  you  don't  want  to  go  and  load  up  with  a  love 
affair  that  you  '11  keep  trying  to  unload  as  long  as 
you  live.  No,  sir !  Look  at  me  !  I  know  I  'm  not 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     291 

an  example  in  some  things,  but  in  this  little  business 
of  correctly  placed  affections  I  could  give  points  to 
Solomon.  Why  am  I  in  love  with  M.  Swan  1 
Because  I  can't  help  it  for  one  thing,  and  because 
for  another  thing  she  can  do  more  to  develop  the 
hidden  worth  and  unsuspected  powers  of  A.  W.,  Jr., 
than  any  other  woman  in  the  world.  She  may 
never  feel  that  it  ?s  her  mission,  but  she  can't  shake 
my  conviction  that  way;  and  I  shall  stay  un 
developed  to  prove  that  I  was  right.  Well,  now, 
what  you  want,  my  friend,  is  development,  and  you 
can't  get  it  where  you've  been  going.  She  hain't 
got  it  on  hand.  And  what  you  want  to  do  is  not  to 
take  something  else  in  its  place — tender  heart,  stead 
fast  affections,  loyalty ;  they  Ve  got  'em  at  every 
shop  in  town ;  they  're  a  drug  in  the  market. 
You've  got  to  say  'No  development,  heigh?  Well, 
I  '11  just  look  round  a  while,  and  if  I  can't  find  it  at 
some  of  the  other  stores  I  '11  come  back  and  take 
some  of  that  steadfast  affection.  You  say  it  won't 
come  off  1  Or  run  in  washing  1 '  See  ? " 

"You  ought  to  be  ashamed  of  yourself,"  said 
Lemuel,  trying  to  summon  an  indignant  feeling,  and 
laughing  with  a  strange  pleasure  at  heart.  "  You  've 
got  no  right  to  talk  to  me  that  way.  I  want  you 
should  leave  me  alone  ! " 

"  Well,  since  you  're  so  pressing,  I  will  go,"  said 
Berry  easily.  "  But  if  I  find  you  at  our  next  inter 
view  sitting  under  the  shade  of  the  mustard-tree 
whose  little  seed  I  have  just  dropped,  I  shall  feel 
that  I  have  not  laboured  in  vain.  *  She 's  a  darling, 


292  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE. 

she 's  a  daisy,  she  's  a  dumpling,  she 's  a  lamb ! '  I 
refer  to  Miss  Swan,  of  course ;  but  on  other  lips  the 
terms  are  equally  applicable  to  Miss  Carver;  and 
don't  you  forget  it !  " 

He  swung  out  of  the  office  with  a  mazurka  step. 
His  silk  hat,  gaily  tilted  on  the  side  of  his  head, 
struck  against  the  door-jamb,  and  fell  rolling  across 
the  entry  floor.  Lemuel  laughed  wildly.  At 
twenty  these  things  are  droll.  ' 


XXI. 

A  WEEK  passed,  and  Lemuel  had  not  tried  to  see 
Statira  again.  He  said  to  himself  that  even  when 
he  had  tried  to  do  what  was  right,  and  to  show 
those  young  ladies  how  much  he  thought  of  her  by 
bringing  her  to  see  their  pictures,  she  had  acted 
very  ungratefully,  and  had  as  good  as  tried  to 
quarrel  with  him.  Then,  when  he  went  to  see  her 
before  his  visit  home,  she  was  out;  she  had  never 
been  out  before  when  he  called. 

Now,  he  had  told  Berry  that  they  were  not  en 
gaged.  At  first,  this  shocked  him  as  if  it  were  a 
lie.  Then  he  said  to  himself  that  he  had  a  right 
to  make  that  answer  because  Berry  had  no  right 
to  ask  the  questions  that  led  to  it.  Then  he  asked 
himself  if  he  really  were  engaged  to  Statira.  He 
had  told  her  that  he  liked  her  better  than  any  one 
else  in  the  world,  and  she  had  said  as  much  to  him. 
But  he  pretended  that  he  did  not  know  whether  it 
could  be  called  an  engagement. 

There  was  no  one  who  could  solve  the  question 
for  him,  and  it  kept  asking  itself  that  whole  week, 
and  especially  when  he  was  with  Miss  Carver,  as 
happened  two  or  three  times  through  Berry's  con- 


294  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

nivance.  Once  he  had  spent  the  greater  part  of 
an  evening  in  the  studio,  where  he  talked  nearly  all 
the  time  with  Miss  Carver,  and  he  found  out  that 
she  was  the  daughter  of  an  old  ship's  captain  at 
Corbitant ;  her  mother  was  dead,  and  her  aunt  had 
kept  house  for  her  father.  It  was  an  old  square 
house  that  her  grandfather  built,  in  the  days  when 
Corbitant  had  direct  trade  with  France.  She 
described  it  minutely,  and  told  how  a  French 
gentleman  had  died  there  in  exile  at  the  time  of  the 
French  revolution  and  who  was  said  to  haunt  the 
house ;  but  Miss  Carver  had  never  seen  any  ghosts 
in  it.  They  all  began  to  talk  of  ghosts  and  weird 
experiences ;  even  Berry  had  had  some  strange 
things  happen  to  him  in  the  West.  Then  the  talk 
broke  in  two  again,  and  Lemuel  sat  apart  with  Miss 
Carver,  who  told  at  length  the  plot  of  a  story  she 
had  been  reading;  it  was  a  story  called  Romola ; 
and  she  said  she  would  lend  it  to  Lemuel ;  she  said 
she  did  not  see  how  any  one  could  bear  to  be  the  least 
selfish  or  untrue  after  reading  it.  That  made  Lemuel 
feel  cold;  but  he  could  not  break  away  from  her 
charm.  She  sat  where  the  shaded  lamp  threw  its  soft 
light  on  one  side  of  her  face  ;  it  looked  almost  like 
the  face  of  a  spirit,  and  her  eyes  were  full  of  a 
heavenly  gentleness. 

Lemuel  asked  himself  how  he  could  ever  have 
thought  them  proud  eyes.  He  asked  himself  at  the 
same  time  and  perpetually,  whether  he  was  really 
engaged  to  Statira  or  not.  He  thought  how  different 
this  evening  was  from  those  he  spent  with  her.  She 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  295 

could  not  talk  about  anything  but  him  and  her 
dress ;  and  'Manda  Grier  could  not  do  anything 
but  say  saucy  things  which  she  thought  were  smart. 
Miss  Swan  was  really  witty ;  it  was  as  good  as  the 
theatre  to  hear  her  and  Berry  going  on  together. 
Berry  was  pretty  bright ;  there  was  no  denying  it. 
He  sang  to  his  banjo  that  night ;  one  of  the  songs 
was  Spanish  ;  he  had  learned  it  in  New  Mexico. 

Lemuel  began  to  understand  better  how  such  nice 
young  ladies  could  go  with  Berry.  At  first,  after 
Berry  talked  so  to  him  that  night  in  the  office 
against  Statira,  he  determined  that  he  would  keep 
away  from  him.  But  Berry  was  so  sociable  and 
good-natured  that  he  could  not.  The  first  thing  he 
knew,  Lemuel  was  laughing  at  something  Berry  said, 
and  then  he  could  not  help  himself. 

Berry  was  coming  now,  every  chance  he  had,  to 
talk  about  the  art-students.  He  seemed  to  take  it 
for  granted  that  Lemuel  was  as  much  interested  in 
Miss  Carver  as  he  was  himself  in  Miss  Swan ;  and 
Lemuel  did  begin  to  speak  of  her  in  a  shy  way. 
Berry  asked  him  if  he  had  noticed  that  she  looked 
like  that  Spanish  picture  of  the  Virgin  that  Miss 
Swan  had  pinned  up  next  to  the  door  ;  and  Lemuel 
admitted  that  there  was  some  resemblance. 

"Notice  those  eyes  of  hers,  so  deep,  and  sorry 
for  everybody  in  general  ?  If  it  was  anybody  in 
particular,  that  fellow  would  be  in  luck.  Oh.  she  ;s  a 
dumpling,  there  's  no  mistake  about  it !  '  Nymph} 
in  thy  orisons  be  all  my  sins  remembered  ! ' 
That 's  Miss  Carver's  style.  She  looks  as  if  she  just 


296  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

wanted  to  forgive  somebody  something.  I  'm  afraid 
you  ain't  wicked  enough,  Barker.  Look  here!  What's 
the  reason  we  can't  make  up  a  little  party  for  the 
Easter  service  at  the  Catholic  cathedral  Sunday 
night  ]  The  girls  would  like  to  go,  I  know." 

"  No,  no,  I  can't !  I  mustn't ! "  said  Lemuel,  and 
he  remained  steadfast  in  his  refusal.  It  would  be  the 
second  Sunday  night  that  he  had  not  seen  Statira, 
and  he  felt  that  he  must  not  let  it  pass  so.  Berry 
went  off  to  the  cathedral  with  the  art-students  ; 
and  he  kept  out  of  the  way  till  they  were  gone. 

He  said  to  himself  that  he  would  go  a  little  later 
than  usual  to  see  Statira,  to  let  her  know  that  he  was 
not  so  very  anxious ;  but  when  he  found  her  alone, 
and  she  cried  on  his  neck,  and  owned  that  she  had 
not  behaved  as  she  should  that  night  when  she  went 
to  see  the  pictures,  and  that  she  had  been  afraid  he 
hated  her,  and  was  not  coming  any  more,  he  had 
stayed  away  so  long,  his  heart  was  melted,  and  he  did 
everything  to  soothe  and  comfort  her,  and  they  were 
more  loving  together  than  they  had  been  since  the 
first  time.  'Manda  Grier  came  in,  and  said  through 
her  nose,  like  an  old  country-woman,  "'The  falling 
out  of  faithful  friends,  renewing  is  of  love  ! ' "  and 
Statira  exclaimed  in  the  old  way,  "  'Manda, !  "  that 
he  had  once  thought  so  cunning,  and  rested  there  in 
his  arms  with  her  cheek  tight  pressed  against  his. 

She  did  not  talk ;  except  when  she  was  greatly 
excited  about  something,  she  rarely  had  anything  to 
say.  She  had  certain  little  tricks,  poutings,  bridlings, 
starts,  outcries,  which  had  seemed  the  most  bewitch- 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.    297 

ing  things  in  the  world  to  Lemuel.  She  tried  all  these 
now,  unaffectedly  enough,  in  listening  to  his  account 
of  his  visit  home,  and  so  far  as  she  could  she  vividly 
sympathised  with  him. 

He  came  away  heavy  and  unhappy.  Somehow, 
these  things  no  longer  sufficed  for  him.  He  com 
pared  this  evening  with  the  last  he  had  spent  with 
the  art-students,  which  had  left  his  brain  in  a  glow, 
and  kept  him  awake  for  hours  with  luminous 
thoughts.  But  he  had  got  over  that  unkindness  to 
Statira,  and  he  was  glad  of  that.  He  pitied  her  now, 
and  he  said  to  himself  that  if  he  could  get  her 
away  from  'Man da  Grier,  and  under  the  influence  of 
such  girls  as  Miss  Swan  and  Miss  Carver,  it  would 
be  much  better  for  her.  He  did  not  relent  toward 
'Manda  Grier;  he  disliked  her  more  than  ever, 
and  in  the  friendship  which  he  dramatised  between 
Statira  and  Miss  Carver,  he  saw  her  cast  adrift 
without  remorse. 

Sewell  had  told  him  that  he  was  always  at  leisure 
Monday  night,  and  the  next  evening  Lemuel  went 
to  pay  his  first  visit  to  the  minister  since  his  first 
day  in  Boston.  It  was  early,  and  Evans,  who 
usually  came  that  evening,  had  not  arrived  yet,  but 
Sewell  had  him  in  his  thought  when  he  hurried 
forward  to  meet  his  visitor. 

"  Oh,  is  it  you,  Mr.  Barker  rl  "  he  asked  in  a  note 
of  surprise.  "  I  am  glad  to  see  you.  I  had  been 
intending  to  come  and  look  you  up  again.  Will  you 
sit  down  ?  Mr.  Evans  was  here  the  other  night,  and 
we  were  talking  of  you.  I  hope  you  are  all  well  1 " 


298  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

"  Very  well,  thank  you,"  said  Lemuel,  taking  the 
hand  the  minister  offered,  and  then  taking  the  chair 
he  indicated.  Sewell  did  not  know  exactly  whether 
to  like  the  greater  ease  which  Lemuel  showed  in  his 
presence  ;  but  there  was  nothing  presumptuous  in  it, 
and  he  could  not  help  seeing  the  increased  refine 
ment  of  the  young  man's  beauty.  The  knot  between 
his  eyes  gave  him  interest,  while  it  inflicted  a  vague 
pang  upon  the  minister.  "  I  have  been  at  home 
since  I  saw  you."  Lemuel  looked  down  at  his  neat 
shoes  to  see  if  they  were  in  fit  state  for  the  minister's 
study-carpet,  and  Sewell's  eye  sympathetically  follow 
ing,  wandered  to  the  various  details  of  Lemuel's 
simple  and  becoming  dress, — the  light  spring  suit 
which  he  had  indulged  himself  in  at  the  Misfit 
Parlours  since  his  mother  had  bidden  him  keep 
his  money  for  himself  and  not  send  so  much  of  it- 
home. 

"  Ah,  have  you  ?  "  cried  the  minister.  "  I  hope 
you  found  your  people  all  well  ?  How  is  the 
place  looking  1  I  suppose  the  season  isn't  quite  so 
advanced  as  it  is  with  us." 

"  There 's  some  snow  in  the  woods  yet,"  said 
Lemuel,  laying  the  stick  he  carried  across  the  hat- 
brim  on  his  knees.  "  Mother  was  well ;  but  my  sister 
and  her  husband  have  had  a  good  deal  of  sickness." 

"Oh,  I'm  sorry  for  that,"  said  Sewell,  with  the 
general  sympathy  which  Evans  accused  him  of  keep 
ing  on  tap  professionally.  "  Well,  how  did  you  like 
the  looks  of  Willoughby  Pastures  compared  with 
Boston  ?  Rather  quieter,  I  suppose." 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     299 

"  Yes,  it  was  quieter,"  answered  Lemuel. 

"  But  the  first  touch  of  spring  must  be  very  lovely 
there !  I  find  myself  very  impatient  with  these 
sweet,  early  days  in  town.  I  envy  you  your  escape 
to  such  a  place." 

Lemuel  opposed  a  cold  silence  to  the  lurking 
didacticism  of  these  sentences,  and  Sewell  hastened 
to  add,  "  And  I  wish  I  could  have  had  your 
experience  in  contrasting  the  country  and  the  town, 
after  your  long  sojourn  here,  on  your  first  return 
home.  Such  a  chance  can  come  but  once  in  a  life 
time,  and  to  very  few." 

"There  are  some  pleasant  things  about  the 
country,"  Lemuel  began. 

"  Oh,  I  am  sure  of  it  ! "  cried  Sewell,  with 
cheerful  aimlessness. 

"  The  stillness  was  a  kind  of  rest,  after  the  noise 
here  ;  I  think  any  one  might  be  glad  to  get  back  to 
such  a  place " 

"  I  was  sure  you  would,"  interrupted  Sewell. 

"  If  he  was  discouraged  or  broken  down  any  way," 
Lemuel  calmly  added. 

"  Oh  !  "  said  Sewell.  "  You  mean  that  you  found 
more  sympathy  among  your  old  friends  and  neigh 
bours  than  you  do  here  1  " 

"No,"  said  Lemuel  bluntly.  "That's  what  city 
people  think.  But  it 's  all  a  mistake.  There  isn't 
half  the  sympathy  in  the  country  that  there  is 
in  the  city.  Folks  pry  into  each  other's  business 
more,  but  they  don't  really  care  so  much.  What  I 
mean  is  that  you  could  live  cheaper,  and  the  fight 


300  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

isn't  so  hard.  You  might  have  to  use  your  hands 
more,  but  you  wouldn't  have  to  use  your  head 
hardly  at  all.  There  isn't  so  much  opposition — 
competition." 

"Oh,"  said  Sewell  a  second  time.  "But  this 
competition — this  struggle — in  which  one  or  the 
other  must  go  to  the  wall,  isn't  that  painful  ]  " 

"I  don't  know  as  it  is,"  answered  Lemuel,  "as 
long  as  you're  young  and  strong.  And  it  don't 
always  follow  that  one  must  go  to  the  wall.  I  Ve 
seen  some  things  where  both  got  on  better." 

Sewell  succumbed  to  this  worldly  wisdom.  He 
was  frequently  at  the  disadvantage  men  of  cloistered 
lives  must  be,  in  having  his  theories  in  advance  of 
his  facts.  He  now  left  this  point,  and  covertly 
touched  another  that  had  come  up  in  his  last  talk 
with  Evans  about  Barker.  "But  you  find  in  the 
country,  don't  you,  a  greater  equality  of  social 
condition.?  People  are  more  on  a  level,  and  have 
fewer  artificial  distinctions." 

"Yes,  there's  that,"  admitted  Lemuel.  "I've 
worried  a  good  deal  about  that,  for  I've  had  to  take 
a  servant's  place  in  a  good  many  things,  and  I've 
thought  folks  looked  down  on  me  for  it,  even  when 
they  didn't  seem  to  intend  to  do  it.  But  I  guess  it 
isn't  so  bad  as  I  thought  \vhen  I  first  began  to  notice 
it.  Do  you  suppose  it  is  1 "  His  voice  was  suddenly 
tense  with  personal  interest  in  the  question  which 
had  ceased  to  be  abstract. 

"Oh,  certainly  not,"  said  the  minister,  with  an 
ease  which  he  did  not  feel. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  301 

"  I  presume  I  had  what  you  may  call  a  servant's 
place  at  Miss  Vane's,"  pursued  Lemuel  unflinchingly, 
"  and  I  Ve  been  what  you  may  call  head  waiter  at 
the  St.  Albans,  since  I  Ye  been  there.  If  a  person 
heard  afterwards,  when  I  had  made  out  something,  if 
I  ever  did,  that  I  had  been  a  servant,  would  they — 
they — despise  me  for  it  1 " 

"  Not  unless  they  were  very  silly  people,"  said 
Sewell  cordially,  "I  can  assure  you." 

"  But  if  they  had  ever  seen  me  doing  a  servant's 
work,  wouldn't  they  always  remember  it,  no  matter 
what  I  was  afterwards  1 "  Sewell  hesitated,  and 
Lemuel  hurried  to  add,  "I  ask  because  I've  made 
up  my  mind  not  to  be  anything  but  clerk  after  this." 

Sewell  pitied  the  simple  shame,  the  simple  pride. 
"That  isn't  the  question  for  you  to  ask,  my  dear 
boy,"  he  answered  gently,  and  with  an  affection 
which  he  had  never  felt  for  his  charge  before. 
"  There 's  another  question,  more  important,  and 
one  which  you  must  ask  yourself  :  '  Should  I  care 
if  they  did  ? '  After  all,  the  matter 's  in  your  own 
hands.  Your  soul's  always  your  own  till  you  do 
something  wrong." 

"Yes,  I  understand  that."  Lemuel  sat  silently 
thoughtful,  fingering  his  hat-band.  It  seemed  to 
Sewell  that  he  wished  to  ask  something  else,  and 
was  mustering  his  courage ;  but  if  this  was  so,  it 
exhaled  in  a  sigh,  and  he  remained  silent. 

"  I  should  be  sorry,"  pursued  the  minister,  "  to 
have  you  dwell  upon  such  things.  There  are  certain 
ignoble  facts  in  life  which  we  can  best  combat  by 


302  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

ignoring  them.  A  slight  of  almost  any  sort  ceases 
to  be  when  you  cease  to  consider  it."  This  did  not 
strike  Sewell  as  wholly  true  when  he  had  said  it,  and 
he  was  formulating  some  modification  of  it  in  his 
mind,  when  Lemuel  said — 

"  I  presume  a  person  can  help  himself  some  by 
being  ashamed  of  caring  for  such  things,  and  that 's 
what  I  've  tried  to  do." 

"  Yes,  that 's  what  I  meant " 

"  I  guess  I  've  exaggerated  the  whole  thing  some. 
But  if  a  thing  is  so,  thinking  it  ain't  won't  unmake 
it." 

"No,"  admitted  Sewell  reluctantly.  "But  I 
should  be  sorry,  all  the  same,  if  you  let  it  annoy — 
grieve  you.  What  has  pleased  me  in  what  I  've 
been  able  to  observe  in  you,  has  been  your  willing 
ness  to  take  hold  of  any  kind  of  honest  work.  I 
liked  finding  you  with  your  coat  off  washing  dishes, 
that  morning,  at  the  Wayfarer's  Lodge,  and  I  liked 
your  going  at  once  to  Miss  Vane's  in  a — as  you 
did- 

"  Of  course,"  Lemuel  interrupted,  "  I  could  do  it 
before  I  knew  how  it  was  looked  at  here." 

"  And  couldn't  you  do  it  now  1 " 

"Not  if  there  was  anything  else." 

"  Ah,  that 's  the  great  curse  of  it ;  that 's  what  I 
deplore,"  Sewell  broke  out,  "in  our  young  people 
coming  from  the  country  to  the  city.  They  must  all 
have  some  genteel  occupation  !  I  don't  blame  them; 
but  I  would  gladly  have  saved  you  this  experience — 
this  knowledge — if  I  could.  I  felt  that  I  had  done 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     303 

you  a  kind  of  wrong  in  being  the  means,  however 
indirectly  and  innocently,  of  your  coming  to  Boston, 
and  I  would  willingly  have  done  anything  to  have 
you  go  back  to  the  country.  But  you  seemed  to  dis 
trust  me — to  find  something  hostile  in  me — and  I 
did  not  know  how  to  influence  you." 

"Yes,  I  understand  that,"  said  Lemuel.  "I 
couldn't  help  it,  at  first.  But  I  Ve  got  to  see  it  all  in 
a  different  light  since  then.  I  know  that  you  meant 
the  best  by  me.  I  know  now  that  what  I  wrote 
wasn't  worth  anything,  and  just  how  you  must  have 
looked  at  it.  I  didn't  know  some  things  then  that  I 
do  now ;  and  since  I  have  got  to  know  a  little  more  I 
have  understood  better  what  you  meant  by  all  you 
said." 

"I  am  very  glad,"  said  Sewell,  with  sincere 
humility,  "  that  you  have  kept  no  hard  feeling 
against  me." 

"  Oh,  not  at  all.  It 's  all  right  now.  I  couldn't 
explain  very  well  that  I  hadn't  come  to  the  city  just 
to  be  in  the  city,  but  because  I  had  to  do  something 
to  help  along  at  home.  You  didn't  seem  to  under 
stand  that  there  wa'n't  anything  there  for  me  to  take 
hold  of." 

"No,  I  'm  afraid  I  didn't,  or  wouldn't  quite  under 
stand  that ;  I  was  talking  and  acting,  I  'm  afraid, 
from  a  preconceived  notion."  Lemuel  made  no 
reply,  not  having  learned  yet  to  utter  the  pleasant 
generalities  with  which  city  people  left  a  subject ; 
and  after  a  while  Sewell  added,  "  I  am  glad  to  have 
seen  your  face  so  often  at  church.  You  have  been  a 


304  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

great  deal  in  my  mind,  and  I  have  wished  to  do 
something  to  make  your  life  happy,  and  useful  to 
you  in  the  best  way,  here,  but  I  haven't  quite  known 
how."  At  this  point  Sewell  realised  that  it  was 
nearly  eight  months  since  Lemuel  had  come  to 
Boston,  and  he  said  contritely,  "I  have  not  made 
the  proper  effort,  I  'm  afraid  ;  but  I  did  "not  know 
exactly  how  to  approach  you.  You  were  rather  a 
difficult  subject,"  he  continued,  with  a  smile  in  which 
Lemuel  consented  to  join,  "  but  now  that  we  've  come 

to  a  clearer  understanding "  He  broke  off  and 

asked,  "  Have  you  many  acquaintances  in  Boston  ? " 

Lemuel  hesitated,  and  cleared  his  throat,  "Not 
many. " 

Something  in  his  manner  prompted  the  minister 
to  say,  "That  is  such  a  very  important  thing  for 
young  men  in  a  strange  place.  I  wish  you  would 
come  oftener  to  see  us,  hereafter.  Young  men,  in 
the  want  of  companionship,  often  form  disadvan 
tageous  acquaintances,  which  they  can't  shake  off 
afterwards,  when  they  might  wish  to  do  so.  I  don't 
mean  evil  acquaintance ;  I  certainly  couldn't  mean 
that  in  your  case ;  but  frivolous  ones,  from  which 
nothing  high  or  noble  can  come— nothing  of 
improvement  or  development." 

Lemuel  started  at  the  word  and  blushed.  It  was 
Berry's  word.  Sewell  put  his  own  construction  on 
the  start  and  the  blush. 

"Especially,"  he  went  on,  "I  should  wish  any 
young  man  whom  I  was  interested  in  to  know  refined 
and  noble  woman."  He  felt  that  this  was  perhaps  in 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     305 

Lemuel's  case  too  much  like  prescribing  port  wine 
and  carriage  exercise  to  an  indigent  patient,  and  he 
added,  "If  you  cannot  know  such  women,  it  is 
better  to  know  none  at  all.  It  is  not  what  women 
say  or  do,  so  much  as  the  art  they  have  of  inspiring 
a  man  to  make  the  best  of  himself.  The  accidental 
acquaintances  that  young  people  are  so  apt  to  form 
are  in  most  cases  very  detrimental.  There  is  no 
harm  in  them  of  themselves,  perhaps,  but  all  irre 
gularity  in  the  life  of  the  young  is  to  be  deplored." 

"Do  you  mean,"  asked  Lemuel,  with  that  con- 
creteness  which  had  alarmed  Sewell  before,  "that 
they  ought  to  be  regularly  introduced  ? " 

"  I  mean  that  a  young  girl  who  allowed  a  young 
man  to  make  her  acquaintance  outside  of  the — the 
— social  sanctions — would  be  apt  to  be  a  silly  or 
romantic  person,  at  the  best.  Of  course,  there  are 
exceptions.  But  I  should  be  very  sorry  if  any 
young  man  I  knew — no ;  why  shouldn't  I  say  you,  at 
once  ? — should  involve  himself  in  any  such  way. 
One  thing  leads  to  another,  especially  with  the 
young ;  and  the  very  fact  of  irregularity,  of  romance, 
of  strangeness  in  an  acquaintance,  throws  a  false 
glamour  over  the  relation,  and  appeals  to  the  senti 
ments  in  an  unwarranted  degree." 

"  Yes,  that  is  so,"  said  Lemuel. 

The  admission  stimulated  Sewell  in  the  belief  that 
he  had  a  clue  in  his  hand  which  it  was  his  duty  to 
follow  up.  "  The  whole  affair  loses  proportion  and 
balance.  The  fancy  becomes  excited,  and  some  of 
the  most  important  interests — the  very  most  impor- 
u 


306  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

tant  interests  of  life — are  committed  to  impulse." 
Lemuel  remained  silent,  and  it  seemed  the  silence  of 
conviction.  "  A  young  man  is  better  for  knowing 
women  older  than  himself,  more  cultivated,  devoted 
to  higher  things.  Of  course,  young  people  must  see 
each  other,  must  fall  in  love  and  get  married ;  but 
there  need  be  no  haste  about  such  things.  If  there 
is  haste — if  there  is  rashness,  thoughtlessness — there 
is  sure  to  be  unhappiness.  Men  are  apt  to  outgrow 
their  wives  intellectually,  if  their  wives'  minds  are 
set  on  home  and  children,  as  they  should  be,  and 
allowance  for  this  ought  to  be  made,  if  possible.  I 
would  rather  that  in  the  beginning  the  wife  should 
be  the  mental  superior.  I  hope  it  will  be  several 
years  yet  before  you  think  seriously  of  such  things, 
but  when  the  time  comes,  I  hope  you  will  have  seen 
some  young  girl — there  are  such  for  every  one  of  us 
— whom  it  is  civilisation  and  enlightenment,  refine 
ment,  and  elevation,  simply  to  know.  On  the  other 
hand,  a  silly  girl's  influence  is  degrading  and  ruinous. 
She  either  drags  those  attached  to  her  down  to  her 
own  level ;  or  she  remains  a  weight  and  a  clog  upon 
the  life  of  a  man  who  loves  her." 

"Yes,"  said  Lemuel,  with  a  sigh  which  Sewell 
interpreted  as  that  of  relief  from  danger  recognised 
in  time. 

He  pursued  eagerly.  "  I  could  not  warn  any  one 
too  earnestly  against  such  an  entanglement." 

Lemuel  rose  and  looked  about  with  a  troubled 
glance.  Sewell  continued  :  "  Any  such  marriage — 
a  marriage  upon  any  such  conditions — is  sure  to  be 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     307 

calamitous;  and  if  the  conditions  are  recognised 
beforehand,  it  is  sure  to  be  iniquitous.  So  far  from, 
urging  the  fulfilment  of  even  a  promise,  in  such  a 
case,  I  would  have  every  such  engagement  broken, 

in  the  interest  of  humanity — of  morality " 

Mrs.  Sewell  came  into  the  room,  and  gave  a  little 
start  of  surprise,  apparently  not  mixed  with  pleasure, 
at  seeing  Lemuel.  She  had  never  been  able  to  share 
her  husband's  interest  in  him,  while  insisting  upon 
his  responsibility ;  she  disliked  him  not  logically, 
but  naturally,  for  the  wrong  and  folly  which  he  had 
been  the  means  of  her  husband's  involving  himself 
in  ;  Miss  Vane's  kindliness  toward  Lemuel,  which 
still  survived,  and  which  expressed  itself  in  questions 
about  him  whenever  she  met  the  minister,  was 
something  that  Mrs.  Sewell  could  not  understand. 
She  now  said,  "  Oh  !.  Mr.  Barker  !  "  and  coldly  gave 
him  her  hand.  "  Have  you  been  well  ?  Must  you 


"  Yes,  thank  you.  I  have  got  to  be  getting  back. 
Well,  good  evening."  He  bowed  to  the  Sewells. 

"  You  must  come  again  to  see  me,"  said  the 
minister,  and  looked  at  his  wife. 

"Yes,  it  has  been  a  very  long  time  since  you  were 
here,"  Mrs.  Sewell  added. 

"  I  haven't  had  a  great  deal  of  time  to  myself," 
said  Lemuel,  and  he  contrived  to  get  himself  out  of 
the  room. 

Sewell  followed  him  down  to  the  door,  in  the 
endeavour  to  say  something  more  on  the  subject  his 
wife  had  interrupter),  but  he  only  contrived  to  utter 


308  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  •  OR, 

some  feeble  repetitions.  He  came  back  in  vexation, 
which  he  visited  upon  Lemuel.  "  Silly  fellow  !  "  he 
exclaimed. 

"  What  has  he  been  doing  now  ? "  asked  Mrs. 
Sewell,  with  reproachful  discouragement. 

"  Oh,  /  don't  know !  I  suspect  that  he 's  been 
involving  himself  in  some  ridiculous  love  affair  ! " 
Mrs.  Sewell  looked  a  silent  inculpation.  "It's 
largely  conjecture  on  my  part,  of  course, — he 's 
about  as  confiding  as  an  oyster  ! — but  I  fancy  I  have 
said  some  things  in  a  conditional  way  that  will  give 
him  pause.  I  suspect  from  his  manner  that  he  has 
entangled  himself  with  some  other  young  simple 
ton,  and  that  he  Js  ashamed  of  it,  or  tired  of  it, 
already.  If  that 's  the  case,  I  have  hit  the  nail  on 
the  head.  I  told  him  that  a  foolish,  rash  engage 
ment  was  better  broken  than  kept.  The  foolish 
marriages  that  people  rush  into  are  the  greatest 
bane  of  life  ! " 

"  And  would  you  really  have  advised  him,  David," 
asked  his  wife,  "  to  break  off  an  engagement  if  he 
had  made  one  ? " 

"  Of  course  I  should  !     I— 

"  Then  I  am  glad  I  came  in  in  time  to  prevent 
your  doing  anything  so  wicked." 

"  Wicked  1 "  Sewell  turned  from  his  desk,  where 
he  was  about  to  sit  down,  in  astonishment. 

"  Yes  !  Do  you  think  that  nobody  else  is  to  be 
considered  in  such  a  thing  1  What  about  the  poor, 
silly  girl  if  he  breaks  off  with  her  1  Oh,  you  men 
are  all  alike  !  Even  the  best  !  You  think  it  is  a 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKEB..     309 

dreadful  thing  for  a  young  man  to  be  burdened  with 
a  foolish  love  affair  at  the  beginning  of  his  career  ; 
but  you  never  think  of  the  girl  whose  whole  career 
is  spoiled,  perhaps,  if  the  affair  is  broken  off! 
Hasn't  she  any  right  to  be  considered  ? " 

"  I  should  think,"  said  Sewell,  distinctly  daunted, 
"  that  they  were  equally  fortunate,  if  it  were  broken 
off." 

"0  my  dear,  you  know  you  don't  think  any 
thing  of  the  kind  !  If  he  has  more  mind  than  she 
has,  and  is  capable  of  doing  something  in  the  world, 
he  goes  on  and  forgets  her ;  but  she  remembers  him. 
Perhaps  it 's  her  one  chance  in  life  to  get  married — 
to  have  a  home.  You  know  very  well  that  in  a 
case  of  that  kind — a  rash  engagement,  as  you  call  it 
— both  are  to  blame ;  and  shall  one  do  all  the  suffer 
ing  1  Very  probably  his  fancy  was  taken  first,  and 
he  followed  her  up,  and  flattered  her  into  liking 
him ;  and  now  shall  he  leave  her  because  he  's  tired 
of  her  * " 

"Yes,"  said  Sewell,  recovering  from  the  first 
confusion  which  his  wife's  unexpected  difference  of 
opinion  had  thrown  him  into,  "  I  should  think  that 
was  the  very  best  reason  in  the  world  why  he  should 
leave  her.  Would  his  marrying  make  matters  worse 
or  better  if  he  were  tired  of  her  1  As  for  wickedness, 
I  should  feel  myself  guilty  if  I  did  not  do  my  utmost 
to  prevent  marriages  between  people  when  one  or  other 
wished  to  break  their  engagement,  and  had  not  the 
moral  courage  to  do  so.  There  is  no  more  pernicious 
delusion  than  that  one's  word  ought  to  be  kept  in 


310  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

such  an  affair,  after  the  heart  has  gone  out  of  it, 
simply  because  it 's  been  given." 

"  David  ! " 

But  Sewell  was  not  to  be  restrained.  "  I  am  right 
about  this,  Lucy,  and  you  know  it.  Half  the  miser 
able  marriages  in  the  world  could  be  prevented,  if 
there  were  only  some  frank  and  fearless  adviser  at 
hand  to  say  to  the  foolish  things  that  if  they  no 
longer  fully  and  freely  love  each  other  they  can 
commit  no  treason  so  deadly  as  being  true  to  their 
word.  I  wish,"  he  now  added,  "that  I  could  be  the 
means  of  breaking  off  every  marriage  that  the 
slightest  element  of  doubt  enters  into  beforehand.  I 
should  leave  much  less  work  for  the  divorce  courts. 
The  trouble  conies  from  that  crazy  and  mischievous 
principle  of  false  self-sacrifice  that  I  'm  always  crying 
out  against.  If  a  man  has  ceased  to  love  the  woman 
he  has  promised  to  marry — or  vice  versa — the  best 
possible  thing  they  can  do,  the  only  righteous  thing, 
is  not  to  marry." 

Mrs.  Sewell  could  not  deny  this.  She  directed  an 
oblique  attack  from  another  quarter,  as  women  do, 
while  affecting  not  to  have  changed  her  ground  at 
all.  "  Very  well,  then,  David,  I  wish  you  would 
have  nothing  to  do  with  that  crazy  and  mischievous 
principle  yourself.  I  wish  you  would  let  this  ridicu 
lous  Barker  of  yours  alone  from  this  time  forth. 
He  has  found  a  good  place,  where  he  is  of  use,  and 
where  he  is  doing  very  well.  Now  I  think  your 
responsibility  is  fairly  ended.  I  hope  you  won't 
meddle  with  his  love  affairs,  if  he  has  any ;  for  if  you 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  311 

do,  you  will  probably  have  your  hands  full.  He  is 
very  good  looking,  and  all  sorts  of  silly  little  geese 
will  be  falling  in  love  with  him." 

"Well,  so  far  his  love  troubles  are  purely  conjec 
tural,"  said  Sewell  with  a  laugh.  "I'm  bound  to 
say  that  Barker  himself  didn't  say  a  word  to  justify 
the  conjecture  that  he  was  either  in  love  or  wished 
to  be  out  of  it,  However,  I  've  given  him  some 
wholesome  advice  which  he  '11  be  all  the  better  for 
taking,  merely  as  a  prophylactic,  if  nothing  else." 

"I  am  tired  of  him,"  sighed  Mrs.  Sewell.  "  Is  he 
going  to  keep  perpetually  turning  up,  in  this  way  ? 
I  hope  you  were  not  very  pressing  with  him  in  your 
invitations  to  him  to  call  again  ?" 

Sewell  smiled.     "  You  were  not,  my  dear." 

"  You  let  him  take  too  much  of  your  time.  I 
was  so  provoked,  when  I  heard  you  going  on  with 
him,  that  I  came  down  to  put  an  end  to  it." 

"  Well,  you  succeeded,"  said  Sewell  easily.  "  Don't 
you  think  he 's  greatly  improved  in  the  short  time 
he 's  been  in  the  city  1 " 

"He's  very  well  dressed.  I  hope  he  isn't 
extravagant." 

"  He 's  not  only  well  dressed,  but  he  's  beginning 
to  be  well  spoken.  I  believe  he's  beginning  to 
observe  that  there  is  such  a  thing  as  not  talking 
through  the  nose.  He  still  says,  •!  don't  know  as,' 
but  most  of  the  men  they  turn  out  of  Harvard  say 
that;  I  've  heard  some  of  the  professors  say  it." 

Mrs.  Sewell  was  not  apparently  interested  in  this. 


XXII. 

THAT  night  Lemuel  told  Mrs.  Harmon  that  she 
must  not  expect  him  to  do  anything  thenceforward 
but  look  after  the  accounts  and  the  general  manage 
ment  ;  she  must  get  a  head-waiter,  and  a  boy  to  run 
the  elevator.  She  consented  to  this,  as  she  would 
have  consented  to  almost  anything  else  that  he 
proposed. 

He  had  become  necessary  to  the  management  of 
the  St.  Albans  in  every  department ;  and  if  the  lady 
boarders  felt  that  they  could  not  now  get  on  with 
out  him,  Mrs.  Harmon  was  even  more  dependent. 
With  her  still  nominally  at  the  head  of  affairs,  and 
controlling  the  expenses  as  a  whole,  no  radical 
reform  could  be  effected.  But  there  were  details  of 
the  outlay  in  \vhich  Lemuel  was  of  use,  and  he  had 
brought  greater  comfort  into  the  house  for  less 
money.  He  rejected  her  old  and  simple  device  of 
postponing  the  payment  of  debt  as  an  economical 
measure,  and  substituted  cash  dealings  with  new 
purveyors.  He  gradually  but  inevitably  took  charge 
of  the  store-room,  and  stopped  the  waste  there ; 
early  in  his  administration  he  had  observed 

312 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     313 

the  gross  and  foolish  prodigality  with  which  the 
portions  were  sent  from  the  carving-room,  and  after 
replacing  Mrs.  Harmon's  nephew  there,  he  esta 
blished  a  standard  portion  that  gave  all  the  needed 
variety,  and  still  kept  the  quantity  within  bounds. 
It  came  to  his  taking  charge  of  this  department 
entirely,  and  as  steward  he  carved  the  meats,  and 
saw  that  nothing  was  in  a  way  to  become  cold 
before  he  opened  the  dining-room  doors  as  head- 
waiter. 

His  activities  promoted  the  leisure  which  Mrs. 
Harmon  had  always  enjoyed,  and  which  her 
increasing  bulk  fitted  her  to  adorn.  Her  nephew 
willingly  relinquished  the  dignity  of  steward.  He 
said  that  his  furnaces  were  as  much  as  he  wanted 
to  take  care  of ;  especially  as  in  former  years,  when 
it  had  begun  to  come  spring,  he  had  experienced  a 
stress  of  mind  in  keeping  the  heat  just  right,  when 
the  ladies  were  all  calling  down  the  tubes  for  more 
of  it  or  less  of  it,  which  he  should  now  be  very  glad 
not  to  have  complicated  with  other  cares.  He  said 
that  now  he  could  look  forward  to  the  month  of 
May  with  some  pleasure. 

The  guests,  sensibly  or  insensibly,  according  to 
their  several  temperaments,  shared  the  increased 
ease  that  came  from  Lemuel's  management.  The 
service  was  better  in  every  way;  their  beds  were 
promptly  made,  their  rooms  were  periodically  swept ; 
every  night  when  they  came  up  from  dinner  they 
found  their  pitchers  of  ice-water  at  their  doors. 
This  change  was  not  accomplished  without  much  of 


314  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

that  rebellion  and  renunciation  which  was  known  at 
the  St.  Albans  as  kicking.  Chambermaids  and  table- 
girls  kicked,  but  they  were  replaced  by  Lemuel,  who 
went  himself  to  the  intelligence  office,  and  pledged 
the  new  ones  to  his  rule  beforehand.  There  was 
even  some  kicking  among  the  guests,  who  objected 
to  the  new  portions,  and  to  having  a  second  bill  sent 
them  if  the  first  remained  unpaid  for  a  week  ;  but  the 
general  sense  of  the  hotel  was  in  Lemuel's  favour. 

He  had  no  great  pleasure  in  the  reform  he  had 
effected.  His  heart  was  not  in  it,  except  as  waste 
and  disorder  and  carelessness  were  painful  to  him. 
He  suffered  to  promote  a  better  state  of  things,  as 
many  a  woman  whose  love  is  for  books  or  pictures 
or  society  suffers  for  the  perfection  of  her  house 
keeping,  and  sacrifices  her  taste  to  achieve  it.  He 
would  have  liked  better  to  read,  to  go  to  lectures,  to 
hear  sermons ;  with  the  knowledge  of  Mr.  Evans's 
life  as  an  editor  and  the  incentive  of  a  writer  near 
him,  he  would  have  liked  to  try  again  iZ  he  could  not 
write  something,  though  the  shame  of  his  failure  in 
Mr.  Se  well's  eyes  had  burned  so  deep.  Above  all, 
since  he  had  begun  to  see  how  city  people  regarded 
the  kind  of  work  he  had  been  doing,  he  would  have 
liked  to  get  out  of  the  hotel  business  altogether,  if 
he  could  have  been  sure  of  any  other. 

As  the  spring  advanced  his  cares  grew  lighter. 
Most  of  the  regular  boarders  went  away  to  country 
hotels  and  became  regular  boarders  there.  Their 
places  were  only  partially  filled  by  transients  from 
the  South  and  West,  who  came  and  went,  and  left 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     315 

Lemuel  large  spaces  of  leisure,  in  which  he  read, 
or  deputed  Mrs.  Harmon's  nephew  to  the  care  of 
the  office  and  pursued  his  studies  of  Boston,  some 
times  with  Mr.  Evans, — whose  newspaper  kept  him 
in  town,  and  who  liked  to  prowl  about  with  him, 
and  to  frequent  the  odd  summer  entertainments, — 
but  mostly  alone.  They  became  friends  after  a 
fashion,  and  were  in  each  other's  confidence  as 
regarded  their  opinions  and  ideas,  rather  than  their 
history ;  now  and  then  Evans  dropped  a  word  about 
the  boy  he  had  lost,  or  his  wife's  health,  but  Lemuel 
kept  his  past  locked  fast  in  his  breast. 

The  art-students  had  gone  early  in  the  summer, 
and  Berry  had  left  Boston  for  Wyoming  at  the  end 
of  the  spring  term  of  the  law-school.  He  had  not 
been  able  to  make  up  his  mind  to  pop  before  Miss 
Swan  departed,  but  he  thought  he  should  fetch  it  by 
another  winter ;  and  he  had  got  leave  to  write  to 
her,  on  condition,  he  said,  that  he  should  conduct 
the  whole  correspondence  himself. 

Miss  Carver  had  left  Lemuel  dreaming  of  her  as 
an  ideal,  yet  true,  with  a  slow,  rustic  constancy,  to 
Statira.  For  all  that  had  been  said  and  done,  he 
had  not  swerved  explicitly  from  her.  There  was  no 
talk  of  marriage  between  them,  and  could  not  be ; 
but  they  were  lovers  still,  and  when  Miss  Carver 
was  gone,  and  the  finer  charm  of  her  society  was 
unfelt,  he  went  back  to  much  of  the  old  pleasure  he 
had  felt  in  Statira's  love.  The  resentment  of  her 
narrow-mindedness,  the  shame  for  her  ignorance 
passed  ;  the  sense  of  her  devotion  remained. 


316  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

'Manda  Grier  wanted  her  to  go  home  with  her 
for  part  of  the  summer,  but  she  would  not  have 
consented  if  Lemuel  had  not  insisted.  She  wrote 
him  back  ill-spelt,  scrawly  little  letters,  in  one  of 
which  she  told  him  that  her  cough  was  all  gone,  and 
she  was  as  well  as  ever.  She  took  a  little  more 
cold  when  she  returned  to  town  in  the  first  harsh 
September  weather,  and  her  cough  returned,  but  she 
said  she  did  not  call  it  anything  now. 

The  hotel  began  to  fill  up  again  for  the  winter. 
Berry  preceded  the  art-students  by  some  nervous 
weeks,  in  which  he  speculated  upon  what  he  should 
do  if  they  did  not  come  at  all.  Then  they  came, 
and  the  winter  passed,  with  repetitions  of  the  last 
winter's  events,  and  a  store  of  common  memories 
that  enriched  the  present,  and  insensibly  deepened 
the  intimacy  in  which  Lemuel  found  himself.  He 
could  not  tell  whither  the  present  was  carrying 
him ;  he  only  knew  that  he  had  drifted  so  far  from 
the  squalor  of  his  past,  that  it  seemed  like  the 
shadow  of  a  shameful  dream. 

He  did  not  go  to  see  Statira  so  often  as  he  used  ; 
and  she  was  patient  with  his  absences,  and  defended 
him  against  'Manda  Grier,  who  did  not  scruple  to 
tell  her  that  she  believed  the  fellow  was  fooling  with 
her,  and  who  could  not  always  keep  down  a  mount 
ing  dislike  of  Lemuel  in  his  presence.  One  night 
towards  spring,  when  he  returned  early  from 
Statira's,  he  found  Berry  in  the  office  at  the  St. 
Albans.  "  That  you,  old  man  ? "  he  asked.  "  Well, 
I  'm  glad  you  Ve  come.  Just  going  to  leave  a  little 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     317 

Billy  Ducks  for  you  here,  but  now  I  needn't.  The 
young  ladies  sent  me  down  to  ask  if  you  had  a  copy 
of  Whittier's  poems ;  they  want  to  find  something  in 
it.  I  told  'em  Longfellow  would  do  just  as  well, 
but  I  couldn't  seem  to  convince  'em.  They  say  he 
didn't  write  the  particular  poem  they  want." 

"Yes,  I've  got  Whittier's  poems  here,"  said 
Lemuel,  unlocking  his  desk.  "  It  belongs  to  Mr. 
Evans ;  I  guess  he  won't  care  if  I  lend  it." 

"  Well,  now,  I  tell  you  what,"  said  Berry ;  "  don't 
you  let  a  borrowed  book  like  that  go  out  of  your 
hands.  Heigh  ?  You  just  bring  it  up  yourself. 
See  1 "  He  winked  the  eye  next  Lemuel  with 
exaggerated  insinuation.  "  They  '11  respect  you  all 
the  more  for  being  so  scrupulous,  and  I  guess  they 
won't  be  very  much  disappointed  on  general  prin 
ciples  if  you  come  along.  There  's  lots  of  human 
nature  in  girls — the  best  of  'em.  I  '11  tell  'em  I  left 
you  lookin'  for  it.  I  don't  mind  a  lie  or  two  in  a 
good  cause.  But  you  hurry  along  up,  now." 

He  was  gone  before  Lemuel  could  stop  him ;  he 
could  not  do  anything  but  follow. 

It  appeared  that  it  was  Miss  Swan  who  wished  to 
see  the  poem ;  she  could  not  remember  the  name  of 
it,  but  she  was  sure  she  should  know  it  if  she  saw  it 
in  the  index.  She  mingled  these  statements  with 
her  greetings  to  Lemuel,  and  Miss  Carver  seemed  as 
glad  to  see  him.  She  had  a  little  more  colour  than 
usual,  and  they  were  all  smiling,  so  that  he  knew 
Berry  had  been  getting  off  some  of  his  jokes.  But 
he  did  not  care. 


318  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

Miss  Swan  found  the  poem  as  she  had  predicted, 
and,  "  Now  all  keep  still,"  she  said,  "  and  I  '11  read 
it."  But  she  suddenly  added,  "  Or  no ;  you  read  it, 
Mr.  Barker,  won't  you  ? " 

"If  Barker  ain't  just  in  voice  to-night,  I'll  read 
it,"  suggested  Berry. 

But  she  would  not  let  him  make  this  diversion. 
She  ignored  his  offer,  and  insisted  upon  Lemuel's 
reading.  "  Jessie  says  you  read  beautifully.  That 
passage  in  Ilomola"  she  reminded  him;  but 
Lemuel  said  it  was  only  a  few  lines,  and  tried  to 
excuse  himself.  At  heart  he  was  proud  of  his  read 
ing,  and  he  ended  by  taking  the  book. 

When  he  had  finished  the  two  girls  sighed. 

"  Isn't  it  beautiful,  Jessie  1 "  said  Miss  Swan. 

"  Beautiful  !  "  answered  her  friend. 

Berry  yawned. 

"  Well,  I  don't  see  much  difference  between  that 
and  a  poem  of  Longfellow's.  Why  wouldn't  Long 
fellow  have  done  just  as  well  ?  Honestly,  now  ! 
Why  isn't  one  poem  just  as  good  as  another,  for  all 
practical  purposes  1 " 

"  It  is,  for  some  people,"  said  Miss  Swan. 

Berry  figured  an  extreme  anguish  by  writhing  in 
his  chair.  Miss  Swan  laughed  in  spite  of  herself, 
and  they  began  to  talk  in  their  usual  banter,  which 
Miss  Carver  never  took  part  in,  and  which  Lemuel 
was  quite  incapable  of  sharing.  If  it  had  come  to 
savage  sarcasm  or  a  logical  encounter,  he  could  have 
held  his  own,  but  he  had  a  natural  weight  and 
slowness  that  disabled  him  from  keeping  up  with 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  319 

Berry's  light  talk;  he  envied  it,  because  it  seemed 
to  make  everybody  like  him,  and  Lemuel  would 
willingly  have  been  liked. 

Miss  Carver  began  to  talk  to  him  about  the  book, 
and  then  about  Mr.  Evans.  She  asked  him  if  he 
went  much  to  his  rooms,  and  Lemuel  said  no,  not 
at  all,  since  the  first  time  Mr.  Evans  had  asked  him 
up.  He  said,  after  a  pause,  that  he  did  not  know 
whether  he  wanted  him  to  come. 

"I  should  think  he  would,"  said  Miss  Carver. 
"  It  must  be  very  gloomy  for  him,  with  his  wife  such 
an  invalid.  He  seems  naturally  such  a  gay  person." 

"Yes,  that's  what  I  think,"  said  Lemuel. 

"  I  wonder,"  said  the  girl,  "  if  it  seems  to  you  harder 
for  a  naturally  cheerful  person  to  bear  things,  than 
for  one  who  has  always  been  rather  melancholy  ? " 

"  Yes,  it  does  ! "  he  answered  with  the  pleasure 
and  surprise  young  people  have  in  discovering  any 
community  of  feeling ;  they  have  thought  themselves 
so  utterly  unlike  each  other.  "I  wonder  why  it 
should  1  " 

"  I  don't  know;  perhaps  it  isn't  so.  But  I  always 
pity  the  cheerful  person  the  most." 

They  recognised  an  amusing  unreason  in  this,  and 
laughed.  Miss  Swan  across  the  room  had  caught 
the  name. 

"  Are  you  talking  of  Mrs.  Evans  ? " 

Berry  got  his  banjo  down  from  the  wall,  where 
Miss  Swan  allowed  him  to  keep  it  as  bric-a-brac, 
and  began  to  tune  it. 

"I  don't    believe  it  agrees  with   this   banjoseph 


320  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

being  an  object  of  virtue,"  he  said.  "  What  shall 
it  be,  ladies  ?  Something  light  and  gay,  adapted 
to  disperse  gloomy  reflections?"  He  played  a 
fandango.  "  How  do  you  like  that  ?  It  has  a  tinge 
of  melancholy  in  it,  and  yet  it's  lively  too,  as  a 
friend  of  mine  used  to  say  about  the  Dead  March," 

"  Was  his  name  Berry  ? "  asked  Miss  Swan. 

"Not  Alonzo  W.,  Jr.,"  returned  Berry  tranquilly, 
and  he  and  Miss  Swan  began  to  joke  together. 

"  I  know  a  friend  of  Mr.  Evans's,"  said  Lemuel  to 
Miss  Carver.  "  Mr.  Sewell.  Have  you  ever  heard 
him  preach  1 " 

"  Oh  yes,  indeed.  We  go  nearly  every  Sunday 
morning." 

"I  nearly  always  go  in  the  evening  now,"  said 
Lemuel.  "  Don't  you  like  him  1 " 

11  Yes,"  said  the  girl.  "  There  's  something  about 
him — I  don't  know  what — that  doesn't  leave  you 
feeling  how  bad  you  are,  but  makes  you  want  to  be 
better.  He  helps  you  so  ;  and  he 's  so  clear.  And 
he  shows  that  he 's  had  all  the  mean  and  silly 
thoughts  that  you  have.  I  don't  know — it 's  as 
if  he  were  talking  for  each  person  alone." 

"  Yes,  that  is  exactly  the  way  I  feel  !  "  Lemuel 
was  proud  of  the  coincidence.  He  said,  to  commend 
himself  further  to  Miss  Carver,  "I  have  just  been 
round  to  see  him." 

"I  should  think  you  would  value  his  acquaint 
ance  beyond  anything,"  said  the  girl.  "  Is  he  just  as 
earnest  and  simple  as  he  is  in  the  pulpit  ? " 

"He's  just  the  same,  every  way."     Lemuel  went 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     321 

a  little  further  ;  "  I  knew  him  before  I  came  to 
Boston.  He  boarded  one  summer  where  we  lived." 
As  he  spoke  he  thought  of  the  grey,  old,  unpainted 
house,  and  of  his  brother-in-law  with  his  stocking- 
feet  on  the  stove-hearth,  and  his  mother's  bloomers  ; 
he  thought  of  his  arrest,  and  his  night  in  the  police- 
station,  his  trial,  and  the  Wayfarer's  Lodge  ;  and  he 
wondered  that  he  could  think  of  such  things  and 
still  look  such  a  girl  in  the  face.  But  he  was  not 
without  that  strange  joy  in  their  being  unknown  to 
her  which  reserved  and  latent  natures  feel  in  mere 
reticence,  and  which  we  all  experience  in  some 
degree  when  we  talk  with  people  and  think  of  our 
undiscovered  lives. 

They  went  on  a  long  time,  matching  their  opinions 
and  feelings  about  many  things,  as  young  people  do, 
and  fancying  that  much  of  what  they  said  was  new 
with  them.  When  he  came  away  after  ten  o'clock, 
he  thought  of  one  of  the  things  that  Sewell  had  said 
about  the  society  of  refined  and  noble  'women :  it 
was  not  so  much  what  they  said  or  did  that  helped  ; 
it  was  something  in  them  that  made  men  say  and  do 
their  best,  and  help  themselves  to  be  refined  and 
noble  men,  to  make  the  most  of  themselves  in  their 
presence.  He  believed  that  this  was  what  Miss 
Carver  had  done,  and  he  thought  how  different  it 
was  with  him  when  he  came  away  from  an  evening 
with  Statira.  Again  he  experienced  that  compassion 
for  her,  in  the  midst  of  his  pride  and  exultation ;  he 
asked  himself  what  he  could  do  to  help  her ;  he  did 
not  see  how  she  could  be  changed. 
x 


322  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

Berry  followed  him  downstairs,  and  wanted  to 
talk  the  evening  over 

"  I  don't  see  how  I  'm  going  to  stand  it  much 
longer,  Barker,"  he  said.  "I  shall  have  to  pop 
pretty  soon  or  die,  one  of  the  two ;  and  I  'm  afraid 
either  one  '11  kill  me.  Wasn't  she  lovely  to-night  1 
Honey  in  the  comb,  sugar  in  the  gourd,  /say  !  I 
wonder  what  it  is  about  popping,  anyway,  that  makes 
it  so  hard,  Barker  ?  It 's  simply  a  matter  of  business, 
if  you  come  to  boil  it  down.  You  offer  a  fellow  so 
many  cattle,  and  let  him  take  'em  or  leave  'em.  But 
if  the  fellow  happens  to  have  on  a  long,  slim,  olive- 
green  dress  of  some  colour,  and  holds  her  head  like  a 
whole  floral  tribute  on  a  stem,  and  you  happen  to  be 
the  cattle  you  're  offering,  you  can't  feel  so  indepen 
dent  about  it,  somehow.  Well,  what 's  the  use  '( 
She  's  a  daisy,  if  ever  there  was  one.  Ever  notice 
what  a  peculiar  blue  her  eyes  are  1 " 

"  Blue  1 "  said  Lemuel.     "  They  're  brown." 

"  Look  here,  old  man,"  said  Berry  compassionately, 
"  do  you  think  I  've  come  down  here  to  fool  away  my 
time  talking  about  Miss  Carver  ?  We  '11  take  some 
Saturday  afternoon  for  that,  when  we  haven't  got 
anything  else  to  do ;  but  it 's  Miss  Swan  that  has  the 
floor  at  present.  What  were  you  two  talking  about 
over  there,  so  long  1  I  can't  get  along  with  Miss 
Carver  worth  a  cent." 

"  I  hardly  know  what  we  did  talk  about,"  said 
Lemuel  dreamily. 

"  Well,  I  've  got  the  same  complaint,  I  couldn't 
tell  you  ten  words  that  Madeline  said — in  thine 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     323 

absence  let  me  call  thee  Madeline,  sweet ! — but  I 
knew  it  was  making  an  immortal  spirit  of  me,  right 
straight  along,  every  time.  The  worst  thing  about 
an  evening  like  this  is,  it  don't  seem  to  last  any  time 
at  all.  Why,  when  those  girls  began  to  put  up  their 
hands  to  hide  their  yawns,  I  felt  like  I  was  just 
starting  in  for  a  short  call.  I  wish  I  could  have  had 
a  good  phonograph  around.  I  'd  put  it  on  my  sleep 
less  pillow,  and  unwind  its  precious  record  all  through 
the  watches  of  the  night."  He  imitated  the  thin 
phantasmal  squeak  of  the  instrument  in  repeating  a 
number  of  Miss  Swan's  characteristic  phrases.  "  Yes, 
sir,  a  pocket  phonograph  is  the  thing  I  'm  after." 

"  I  don't  see  how  you  can  talk  the  way  you  do," 
said  Lemuel,  shuddering  inwardly  at  Berry's  auda 
cious  freedom,  and  yet  finding  a  certain  comfort  in  it. 

"  That 's  just  the  way  I  felt  myself  at  first.  But 
you  '11  get  over  it  as  you  go  along.  The  nicest  thing 
about  their  style  of  angel  is  that  they  're  perfectly 
human,  after  all.  You  don't  believe  it  now,  of 
course,  but  you  will." 

It  only  heightened  Lemuel's  conception  of  Miss 
Carver's  character  to  have  Berry  talk  so  lightly  and 
daringly  of  her,  in  her  relation  to  him.  He  lay  long 
awake  after  he  went  to  bed,  and  in  the  turmoil  of 
his  thoughts  one  thing  was  clear  :  so  pure  and  high 
a  being  must  never  know  anything  of  his  shameful 
past,  which  seemed  to  dishonour  her  through  his 
mere  vicinity.  He  must  go  far  from  her,  and  she 
must  not  know  why  ;  but  long  afterwards  Mr.  Sewell 
would  tell  her,  and  then  she  would  understand.  He 


324  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

owed  her  this  all  the  more  because  he  could  see  now 
that  she  was  not  one  of  the  silly  persons,  as  Mr. 
Sewell  called  them,  who  would  think  meanly  of  him 
for  having  in  his  ignorance  and  inexperience,  done  a 
servant's  work.  His  mind  had  changed  about  that, 
and  he  wondered  that  he  could  ever  have  suspected 
her  of  such  a  thing. 

About  noon  the  next  day  the  street-door  was 
opened  hesitatingly,  as  if  by  some  one  not  used  to 
the  place;  and  when  Lemuel  looked  up  from  the 
menus  he  was  writing,  he  saw  the  figure  of  one  of 
those  tramps  who  from  time  to  time  presented  them 
selves  and  pretended  to  want  work.  He  scanned 
the  vagabond  sharply,  as  he  stood  moulding  a  soft 
hat  on  his  hands,  and  trying  to  superinduce  an  air 
of  piteous  appeal  upon  the  natural  gaiety  of  his 
swarthy  face.  "  Well  !  what  's  wanted  '\  " 

A  dawning  conjecture  that  had  nickered  up  in  the 
tramp's  eyes  flashed  into  full  recognition. 

"Why,'  mate!" 

Lemuel's  heart  stood  still.  "  What  —  what  do  you 
want  here  1  " 

"  Why,  don't  you  know  me,  mate  ?  " 

All  his  calamity  confronted  Lemuel. 

"  No,"  he  said,  but  nothing  in  him  supported  the 
lie  he  had  uttered. 

"  Wayfarer's  Lodge  ?  "  suggested  the  other  cheer 
fully.  "  Don't  you  remember  1  " 


"  I  guess  you  do,"  said  the  mate  easily.     "  Anyway, 
I  remember  you." 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER,     325 

Lemuel's  feeble  defence  gave  way.  "  Come  in 
here,"  he  said,  and  he  shut  the  door  upon  the 
intruder  and  himself,  and  submitted  to  his  fate. 
"  What  is  it  ?  "  he  asked  huskily. 

"Why,  mate!  what's  the  matter1?  Nobody's 
goin'  to  hurt  you,"  said  the  other  encouragingly. 
"  What 's  your  lay  here  1 " 

"Lay]" 

"Yes.     Got  a  job  here?" 

"I'm  the  clerk,"  said  Lemuel,  with  the  ghost  of 
his  former  pride  of  office. 

"  Clerk  1 "  said  the  tramp  with  good-humoured 
incredulity.  "  Where 's  your  diamond  pin  ?  Where 's 
your  rings  1 "  He  seemed  willing  to  prolong  the 
playful  inquiry.  "  Where 's  your  patent-leather 
boots?" 

"  It 's  not  a  common  hotel.  It 's  a  sort  of  u  family 
hotel,  and  I  'm  the  clerk.  What  do  you  want  1 " 

The  young  fellow  lounged  back  easily  in  his  chair. 
"Why,  I  did  drop  in  to  beat  the  house  out  of  a 
quarter  if  I  could,  or  may  be  ten  cents.  Thank  you, 
sir.  God  bless  you,  sir."  He  interrupted  himself  to 
burlesque  a  professional  gratitude.  "  That  style  of 
thing,  you  know.  But  I  don't  know  about  it  now. 
Look  here,  mate !  what 's  the  reason  you  couldn't 
get  me  a  job  here  too  *?  I  been  off  on  a  six  months' 
cruise  since  I  saw  you,  and  I  'd  like  a  job  on  shore 
first-rate.  Couldn't  you  kind  of  ring  me  in  for 
something1?  I  ain't  afraid  of  work,  although  I  never 
did  pretend  to  love  it.  But  I  should  like  to  reform 
now,  and  get  into  something  steady.  Heigh  ]  " 


326  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"  There  isn't  anything  to  do — there  's  no  place  for 
you,"  Lemuel  began. 

"  Oh,  pshaw,  now,  mate,  you  think  !  "  pleaded  the 
other.  "  I  '11  take  any  sort  of  a  job ;  I  don't  care 
what  it  is.  I  ain't  got  any  o'  that  false  modesty 
about  me.  Been  round  too  much.  And  I  don't 
want  to  go  back  to  the  Wayfarer's  Lodge.  It 's  a 
good  place,  and  I  know  my  welcome's  warm  and 
waitin'  for  me,  between  two  hot  plates  ;  but  the  thing 
of  it  is,  it 's  demoralisin'.  That 's  what  the  chaplain 
said  just  afore  I  left  the— ship,  'n'  I  promised  him 
I  'd  give  work  a  try,  anyway.  Now  you  just  think 
up  something  !  I  ain't  in  any  hurry."  In  proof  he 
threw  his  soft  hat  on  the  desk,  and  took  up  one  of 
the  menus.  "  This  your  bill  of  fare  1  Well,  it  ain't 
bad  !  Yurmiselly  soup,  boiled  holibut,  roast  beef, 
roast  turkey  with  cranberry  sauce,  roast  pork  with 
apple  sauce,  chicken  corquettes,  ditto  patties,  three 
kinds  of  pie ;  bread  puddin',  both  kinds  of  sauce ; 
ice  cream,  nuts,  and  coffee.  Why,  mate  !  " 

Lemuel  sat  dumb  and  motionless.  He  could  see 
no  way  out  of  the  net  that  had  entangled  him.  He 
began  feebly  to  repeat.  "  There  isn't  anything," 
when  some  one  tried  the  door. 

"Mr.  Barker!"  called  Mrs.  Harmon.  "You  in 
there  1 " 

He  made  it  worse  by  waiting  a  moment  before 
he  rose  and  opened  the  door.  "  I  didn't  know  I  'd 
locked  it."  The  lie  came  unbidden  ;  he  groaned  in 
wardly  to  think  how  he  was  telling  nothing  but  lies. 
Mrs.  Harmon  did  not  come  in.  She  glanced  with 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  327 

a  little  question  at  the  young  fellow,  who  had 
gathered  his  hat  from  the  table,  and  risen  with  gay 
politeness. 

It  was  a  crisis  of  the  old  sort ;  the  elevator-boy 
had  kicked,  and  Mrs.  Harmon  said,  "  I  just  stopped 
to  say  that  I  was  going  out  and  I  could  stop  at  the 
intelligence  office  myself  to  get  an  elevator-boy " 

The  mate  took  the  word  with  a  joyous  laugh  at 
the  coincidence.  "  It 's  just  what  me  and  Mr.  Barker 
was  talking  about !  I  'm  from  up  his  way,  and  I  Ve 
just  come  down  to  Boston  to  see  if  I  couldn't  look 
up  a  job ;  and  he  was  tellin'  me,  in  here,  about  your 
wantin'  a  telegraph — I  mean  a  elevator-boy,  but  he 
didn't  think  it  would  suit  me.  But  I  should  like  to 
give  it  a  try,  anyway.  It 's  pretty  dull  up  our  way, 
and  I  got  to  do  something.  Mr.  Barker  11  tell  you 
who  I  am." 

He  winked  at  Lemuel  with  the  eye  not  exposed  to 
Mrs.  Harmon,  and  gave  her  a  broad,  frank,  prepossess 
ing  smile. 

"Well,  of  course,"  said  Mrs.  Harmon  smoothly, 
"  any  friend  of  Mr.  Barker's " 

"We  just  been  talkin'  over  old  times  in  here," 
interrupted  the  mate.  "I  guess  it  was  me  shoved 
that  bolt  in.  I  didn't  want  to  have  anybody  see  me 
talkin'  with  him  till  I  'd  got  some  clothes  that  would 
be  a  little  more  of  a  credit  to  him." 

"  Well,  that 's  right,"  said  Mrs.  Harmon  apprecia 
tively.  "  I  always  like  to  have  everybody  around 
my  house  looking  neat  and  respectable.  I  keep  a 
first-class  house,  and  I  don't  have  any  but  first-class 


328  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

help,  and  I  expect  them  to  dress  accordingly,  from  the 
highest  to  the  lowest." 

"  Yes,  ma'am,"  said  the  mate,  "  that 's  the  way  I 
felt  about  it  myself,  me  and  Mr.  Barker  both  ;^and 
he  was  just  tellin'  me  that  if  I  was  a  mind  to  give 
the  elevator  a  try,  he'd  lend  me  a  suit  of  his 
clothes." 

"  Very  well,  then,"  said  Mrs.  Harmon  •  "  if  Mr. 
Barker  and  you  are  a  mind  to  fix  it  up  between 
you- 

"  Oh,  we  are  ! "  said  the  mate.  "  There  won't  be 
any  trouble  about  that." 

''•  I  don't  suppose  I  need  to  stop  at  the  intelligence 
office.  I  presume  Mr.  Barker  will  show  you  how  to 
work  the  elevator.  He  helped  us  out  with  it  himself 
at  first." 

"Yes,  that's  what  he  said,"  the  other  chimed  in. 
"  But  I  guess  I  'd  better  go  and  change  my  clothes 
first.  Well,  mate,"  he  added  to  Lemuel,  "  I  'in  ready 
when  you  Ye  ready." 

Lemuel  rose  trembling  from  the  chair  where  he 
had  been  chained,  as  it  seemed  to  him,  while  the  mate 
and  Mrs.  Harmon  arranged  their  affair  with  his  tacit 
connivance.  He  had  not  spoken  a  word ;  he  feared 
so  much  to  open  his  lips  lest  another  lie  should  come 
out  of  them,  that  his  sense  of  that  clanger  was  hardly 
less  than  his  terror  at  the  captivity  in  which  he 
found  himself. 

"Yes,"  said  Mrs.  Harmon,  "I'll  look  after  the 
office  till  you  get  back.  Mr.  Barker '11  show  you 
where  you  can  sleep." 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     329 

"  Thank  you,  ma'am,"  said  the  mate,  with  grati 
tude  that  won  upon  her. 

"And  I  'm  glad,"  she  added,  " that  it 's  a  friend  of 
Mr.  Barker's  that's  going  to  have  the  place.  We 
think  everything  of  Mr.  Barker  here." 

"Well,  you  can't  think  more  of  him  than  what 
we  do  up  home,"  rejoined  the  other  with  generous 
enthusiasm. 

In  Lemuel's  room  he  was  not  less  appreciative. 
"  Why,  mate,  it  does  me  good  to  see  how  you  've  got 
along.  I  got  to  write  a  letter  home  at  once,  and 
tell  the  folks  what  friends  you  've  got  in  Boston.  I 
don't  believe  they  half  understand  it."  He  smiled 
joyously  upon  Lemuel,  who  stood  stock  still,  with 
such  despair  in  his  face  that  probably  the  wretch 
pitied  him. 

"  Look  here,  mate,  don't  you  be  afraid  now  !  I  'm 
on  the  reform  lay  with  all  my  might,  and  I  mean 
business.  I  ain't  a-goin'  to  do  you  any  harm,  you  bet 
your  life.  These  your  things  ? "  he  asked,  taking 
Lemuel's  winter  suit  from  the  hooks  where  they 
hung,  and  beginning  to  pull  off  his  coat.  He  talked 
on  while  he  changed  his  dress.  "  I  was  led  away, 
and  I  got  my  come-uppings,  or  the  other  fellow's 
come-uppings,  for  /  wa'n't  to  blame  any,  and  I 
always  said  so,  and  I  guess  the  judge  would  say  so 
too,  if  it  was  to  do  over  again." 

A  frightful  thought  stung  Lemuel  to  life.  "  The 
judge  1  Was  it  a  passenger-ship  ? " 

The  other  stopped  buttoning  Lemuel's  trousers 
round  him  to  slap  himself  on  the  thigh.  "Why, 


330  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE. 

mate  !  don't  you  know  enough  to  know  what  a  sea 
voyage  is  ?  Why,  I  Ve  been  down  to  the  Island  for 
the  last  six  months  !  Hain't  you  never  heard  it 
called  a  sea  voyage  ?  Why,  we  always  come  off  from 
a  cruise  when  we  git  back  !  You  don't  mean  to  say 
you  never  been  one  1  " 

"  Oh,  my  goodness  !  "  groaned  Lemuel.  "  Have — 
have  you  been  in  prison  1 " 

"  Why,  of  course." 

"  Oh,  what  am  I  going  to  do  ? "  whispered  the 
miserable  creature  to  himself. 

The  other  heard  him.  "  Why,  you  hain't  got  to 
do  anything  !  I  'm  on  the  reform,  and  you  might 
leave  everything  layin3  around  loose,  and  I  shouldn't 
touch  it.  Fact !  You  ask  the  ship's  chaplain." 

He  laughed  in  the  midst  of  his  assertions  of  good 
resolutions,  but  sobered  to  the  full  extent,  probably, 
of  his  face  and  nature,  and  tying  Lemuel's  cravat  on 
at  the  glass,  he  said  solemnly,  "  Mate,  it 's  all  right. 
I  'm  on  the  reform." 


XXIII. 

LEMUEL'S  friend  entered  upon  his  duties  with 
what  may  also  be  called  artistic  zeal.  He  showed  a 
masterly  touch  in  managing  the  elevator  from  the 
first  trip.  He  was  ready,  cheerful,  and  obliging ;  he 
lacked  nothing  but  a  little  more  reluctance  and  a 
Seaside  Library  novel  to  be  a  perfect  elevator-boy. 

The  ladies  liked  him  at  once ;  he  was  so  pleasant 
and  talkative,  and  so  full  of  pride  in  Lemuel  that 
they  could  not  help  liking  him ;  and  several  of  them 
promptly  reached  that  stage  of  confidence  where 
they  told  him,  as  an  old  friend  of  Lemuel's,  they 
thought  Lemuel  read  too  much,  and  was  going  to 
kill  himself  if  he  kept  on  a  great  deal  longer.  The 
mate  said  he  thought  so  too,  and  had  noticed  how 
bad  Lemuel  looked  the  minute  he  set  eyes  on  him. 
But  he  asked  what  was  the  use1?  He  had  said 
everything  he  could  to  him  about  it.  He  was  always 
just  so,  up  at  home.  As  he  found  opportunity  he 
did  what  he  could  to  console  Lemuel  with  furtive 
winks  and  nods. 

Lemuel  dragged  absently  and  haggardly  through 
the  day.  In  the  evening  he  told  Mrs.  Harmon  that 
he  had  to  go  round  and  see  Mr.  Sewell  a  moment. 

331 


332  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

It  was  then  nine  o'clock,  and  she  readily  assented ; 
she  guessed  Mr.  Williams— he  had  told  her  his  name 
was  Williams— could  look  after  the  office  while  he 
was  gone.  Mr.  Williams  was  generously  glad  to  do 
so.  Behind  Mrs.  Harmon's  smooth  large  form,  he 
playfully  threatened  her  with  his  hand  levelled  at  his 
shoulder ;  but  even  this  failed  to  gladden  Lemuel. 

It  was  half-past  nine  when  he  reached  the 
minister's  house,  and  the  maid  had  a  visible  re 
luctance  at  the  door  in  owning  that  Mr.  Sewell  was 
at  home.  Mrs.  Sewell  had  instructed  her  not  to  be 
too  eagerly  candid  with  people  who  came  so  late ; 
but  he  was  admitted,  and  Sewell  came  down  from 
his  study  to  see  him  in  the  reception-room. 

"  What  is  the  matter  1  "  he  asked  at  once,  when 
he  caught  sight  of  Lemuel's  face;  "has  anything 
gone  wrong  with  you,  Mr.  Barker  1  "  He  could  not 
help  being  moved  by  the  boy's  looks;  he  had  a 
fleeting  wish  that  Mrs.  Sewell  were  there  to  see  him, 
and  be  moved  too ;  and  he  prepared  himself  as  he 
might  to  treat  the  trouble  which  he  now  expected 
to  be  poured  out. 

"Yes,"  said  Lemuel,  "  I  want  to  tell  you;  I  want 
you  to  tell  me  what  to  do." 

When  he  had  put  the  case  fully  before  the 
minister,  his  listener  was  aware  of  wishing  that  it 
had  been  a  love-trouble,  such  as  he  foreboded  at  first. 

He  drew  a  long  and  deep  breath,  and  before  he 
began  to  speak  he  searched  himself  for  some 
comfort  or  encouragement,  while  Lemuel  anxiously 
scanned  his  face. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  333 

"  Yes — yes  !  I  see  your — difficulty,"  he  began, 
making  the  futile  attempt  to  disown  any  share  in  it. 
"  But  perhaps — perhaps  it  isn't  so  bad  as  it  seems. 
Perhaps  no  harm  will  come.  Perhaps  he  really 
means  to  do  well;  and  if  you  are  vigilant  in — in 

keeping  him  out  of  temptation "  Sewell  stopped, 

sensible  that  he  was  not  coming  to  anything,  and 
rubbed  his  forehead. 

"Do  you  think,"  asked  Lemuel,  dry  mouthed 
with  misery,  "  that  I  ought  to  have  told  Mrs.  Har 
mon  at  once  ? " 

"  Why,  it  is  always  best  to  be  truthful  and  above- 
board — as  a  principle,"  said  the  minister,  feeling 
himself  somehow  dragged  from  his  moorings. 

"  Then  I  had  better  do  it  yet ! " 

"Yes,"  said  Se \vell,  and  he  paused.  "Yes. 
That  is  to  say — As  the  mischief  is  done — Perhaps — 
perhaps  there  is  no  haste.  If  you  exercise  vigilance 
— But  if  he  has  been  in  prison — Do  you  know  what 
he  was  in  for  1 " 

"  No.  I  didn't  know  he  had  been  in  at  all  till  we 
got  to  my  room.  And  then  I  couldn't  ask  him — I 
was  afraid  to." 

"  Yes,"  said  Sewell,  kindly  if  helplessly. 

"  I  was  afraid,  if  I  sent  him  off — or  tried  to — that 
he  would  tell  about  my  being  in  the  Wayfarer's 
Lodge  that  night,  and  they  would  think  I  had  been 
a  tramp.  I  could  have  done  it,  but  I  thought  he 
might  tell  some  lie  about  me ;  anjl  they  might  get 
to  know  about  the  trial " 

"I  see,"  said  Sewell. 


334  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"I  hated  to  lie,"  said  Lemuel  piteously,  "but  I 
seemed  to  have  to." 

There  was  another  yes  on  the  minister's  tongue ; 
he  kept  it  back ;  but  he  was  aware  of  an  instant's 
relief  in  the  speculation — the  question  presented  it 
self  abstractly — as  to  whether  it  was  ever  justifiable 
or  excusable  to  lie.  Were  the  Jesuitical  casuists 
possibly  right  in  some  slight,  shadowy  sort1?  He 
came  back  to  Lemuel  groaning  in  spirit.  "  No — no 
—  no  !  "  he  sighed  ;  "  we  mustn't  admit  that  you  had 
to  lie.  We  must  never  admit  that."  A  truth 
flashed  so  vividly  upon  him  that  it  seemed  almost 
escape.  "  What  worse  thing  could  have  come  from 
telling  the  truth  than  has  come  from  withholding  it  1 
And  that  would  have  been  some  sort  of  end,  and 
this— this  is  only  the  miserable  beginning." 

"Yes,"  said  Lemuel,  with  all  desirable  humility. 
"  But  I  couldn't  see  it  at  once." 

"  Oh,  I  don't  blame  you ;  I  don't  blame  you.,"  said 
Sewell.  "It  was  a  sore  temptation.  I  blame 
myself!  "  he  exclaimed,  with  more  comprehensiveness 
than  Lemuel  knew  •  but  he  limited  his  self-accusal 
by  adding,  "I  ought  to  have  told  Mrs.  Harmon 
myself  what  I  knew  of  your  history  ;  but  I  refrained 
because  I  knew  you  had  never  done  any  harm,  and 
I  thought  it  cruel  that  you  should  be  dishonoured 
by  your  misfortunes  in  a  relation  where  you  were 
usefully  and  prosperously  placed ;  and  so — and  so  I 
didn't.  But  perhaps  I  was  wrong.  Yes,  I  was 
wrong.  I  have  only  allowed  the  burden  to  fall 
more  heavily  upon  you  at  last." 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     335 

It  was  respite  for  Lemuel  to  have  some  one  else 
accusing  himself,  and  he  did  not  refuse  to  enjoy 
it.  He  left  the  minister  to  wring  all  the 
bitterness  he  could  for  himself  out  of  his  final 
responsibility.  The  drowning  man  strangles  his 
rescuer. 

Sewell  looked  up,  and  loosened  his  collar  as  if 
really  stifling.  "Well,  well.  We  must  find  some 
way  out  of  it.  I  will  see — see  what  can  be  done  for 
you  to-morrow." 

Lemuel  recognised  his  dismissal.  "  If  you  say  so, 
Mr.  Sewell,  I  will  go  straight  back  and  tell  Mrs. 
Harmon  all  about  it." 

Sewell  rose  too.  "No— no.  There  is  no  such 
haste.  You  had  better  leave  it  to  me  now.  I 
will  see  to  it — in  the  morning." 

"Thank  you,"  said  Lemuel.  "I  hate  to  give  you 
so  much  trouble." 

"Oh,"  said  Sewell,  letting  him  out  at  the  street- 
door,  and  putting  probably  less  thought  and  mean 
ing  into  the  polite  words  than  they  had  ever  con 
tained  before,  "it's  no  trouble." 

He  went  upstairs  to  his  study,  and  found  Mrs. 
Sewell  waiting  there.  "  Well,  now — what,  David  1 " 

"  Now  what  1 "  he  feebly  echoed. 

"Yes.  What  has  that  wretched  creature  come 
for  now  1 " 

"You  may  well  call  him  a  wretched  creature," 
sighed  Sewell. 

"  Is  he  really  engaged  ?  Has  he  come  to  get  you 
to  marry  him  1 " 


336  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"  I  think  he  'd  rather  have  me  bury  him  at 
present."  Sewell  sat  down,  and,  bracing  his  elbow 
on  his  desk,  rested  his  head  heavily  on  his  hand. 

"Well,"  said  his  wife,  with  a  touch  of  compassion 
tempering  her  curiosity. 

He  began  to  tell  her  what  had  happened,  and  he 
did  not  spare  himself  in  the  statement  of  the  case. 
"  There  you  have  the  whole  affair  now.  And  a  very 
pretty  affair  it  is.  But,  I  declare," he  concluded,  "I 
can't  see  that  any  one  is  to  blame  for  it." 

"  No  one,  David  ? " 

"Well,  Adam,  finally,  of  course.  Or  Eve.  Or 
the  Serpent,"  replied  the  desperate  man. 

Seeing  him  at  this  reckless  pass,  his  wife  fore- 
bore  reproach,  and  asked,  "What  are  you  going 
to  do  ? " 

"  I  am  going  around  there  in  the  morning  to  tell 
Mrs.  Harmon  all  about  Barker." 

"  She  will  send  him  away  instantly." 

"  I  dare  say." 

"  And  what  will  the  poor  thing  do  1 '' 

"Goodness  knows." 

"  I  'm  afraid  Badness  knows.  It  will  drive  him 
to  despair." 

"Well,  perhaps  not — perhaps  not,"  sighed  the 
minister.  "  At  any  rate,  we  must  not  let  him  be 
driven  to  despair.  You  must  help  me,  Lucy. " 

"  Of  course." 

Mrs.  Sewell  was  a  good  woman,  and  she  liked  to 
make  her  husband  feel  it  keenly. 

"I  kne\v  that  it  must  come   to  that,"  she    said. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     337 

"Of  course,  we  must  not  let  him  be  ruined.  If 
Mrs.  Harmon  insists  upon  his  going  at  once— as 
I  Ve  no  doubt  she  will — you  must  bring  him  here, 
and  we  must  keep  him  till  he  can  find  some  other 
home."  She  waited,  and  added,  for  a  final  stroke  of 
merciless  beneficence,  "  He  can  have  Alfred's  room, 
and  Alf  can  take  the  front  attic." 

Sewell  only  sighed  again.  He  knew  she  did  not 
mean  this. 

Barker  went  back  to  the  St.  Albans,  and  shrunk 
into  as  small  space  in  the  office  as  he  could.  He 
pulled  a  book  before  him  and  pretended  to  read, 
hiding  the  side  of  his  face  toward  the  door  with  the 
hand  that  supported  his  head.  His  hand  was  cold 
as  ice,  and  it  seemed  to  him  as  if  his  head  were  in  a 
flame.  Williams  came  and  looked  in  at  him  once, 
and  then  went  back  to  the  stool  which  he  occupied 
just  outside  the  elevator-shaft  when  not  running  it. 
He  whistled  softly  between  his  teeth,  with  intervals 
of  respectful  silence,  and  then  went  on  whistling  in 
absence  of  any  whom  it  might  offend. 

Suddenly  a  muffled  clamour  made  itself  heard 
from  the  depths  of  the  dining-room,  like  that  noise 
of  voices  which  is  heard  behind  the  scenes  at  the 
theatre  when  an  armed  mob  is  about  to  burst  upon 
the  stage.  Irish  tones,  high,  windy,  and  angry, 
yells,  and  oaths  defined  themselves,  and  Mrs.  Harmon 
came  obesely  hurrying  from  the  dining-room  toward 
the  office,  closely  followed  by  Jerry,  the  porter. 
When  upon  duty,  or,  as  some  of  the  boarders  con 
tended,  when  in  the  right  humour,  he  blacked  the 

Y 


338  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

boots,  and  made  the  hard-coal  fires,  and  carried  the 
trunks  up  and  down  stairs.  When  in  the  wrong 
humour,  he  had  sometimes  been  heard  to  swear  at 
Mrs.  Harmon,  but  she  had  excused  him  in  this 
eccentricity  because,  she  said,  he  had  been  with  her 
so  long.  Those  who  excused  it  with  her  on  these 
grounds  conjectured  arrears  of  wages  as  another 
reason  for  her  patience.  His  outbreaks  of  bad  temper 
had  the  Celtic  uncertainty  ;  the  most  innocent  touch 
excited  them,  as  sometimes  the  broadest  snub  failed  to 
do  so ;  and  no  one  could  foretell  what  direction  his 
zigzag  fury  would  take.  He  had  disliked  Lemuel 
from  the  first,  and  had  chafed  at  the  subordination 
into  which  he  had  necessarily  fallen.  He  was  now 
yelling  after  Mrs.  Harmon,  to  know  if  she  was  not 
satisfied  with  wan  gutther-snoipe,  that  she  must 
nades  go  and  pick  up  another,  and  whether  the  new 
wan  was  going  to  be  too  good  to  take  prisints  of 
money  for  his  worruk  from  the  boarthers,  and  put 
all  the  rest  of  the  help  under  the  caumpliment  of 
refusin'  ut,  or  else  demanin'  themselves  by  takin' 
ut  ?  If  this  was  the  case,  he  'd  have  her  to  know 
that  she  couldn't  kape  anny  other  help;  and  the 
quicker  she  found  it  out  the  betther.  Mrs.  Harmon 
was  trying  to  appease  him  by  promising  to  see 
Lemuel  at  once,  and  ask  him  about  it. 

The  porter  raised  his  voice  an  octave.  "  D'  ye 
think  I  'm  a  loyar,  domn  ye  1  Don't  ye  think  I  'm 
tellm'  the  thruth  1  " 

He  followed  her  to  the  little  office,  whither  she 
had  retreated  on  a  purely  mechanical  fulfilment  of  her 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     339 

promise  to  speak  to  Lemuel,  and  crowded  in  upon 
them  there. 

"Here  he  is  now!"  he  roared  in  his  frenzy. 
"  He  's  too  good  to  take  the  money  that 's  offered  to 
'urn  !  He 's  too  good  to  be  waither  !  He  wannts  to 
play  the  gintleman  !  He  thinks  'umself  too  good  to 
do  what  the  other  servants  do,  that 's  been  tin  times 
as  lahng  in  the  house  ! " 

At  the  noise  some  of  the  ladies  came  .hurrying 
out  of  the  public  parlour  to  see  what  the  trouble 
was.  The  street-door  opened,  and  Berry  entered 
with  the  two  art-students.  They  involuntarily 
joined  the  group  of  terrified  ladies. 

"  What 's  the  row  ? "  demanded  Berry.  "  Is  Jerry 
on  the  kick  ? " 

No  one  answered.  Lemuel  stood  pale  and  silent, 
fronting  the  porter,  who  was  shaking  his  fist  in  his 
face.  He  had  not  heard  anything  definite  in  the 
outrage  that  assailed  him.  He  only  conjectured 
that  it  was  exposure  of  Williams's  character,  and  the 
story  of  his  own  career  in  Boston. 

"  Why  don't  you  fire  him  out  of  there,  Barker  1 " 
called  the  law-student.  "  Don't  be  afraid  of  him  ! " 

Lemuel  remained  motionless ;  but  his  glance 
sought  the  pitying  eyes  of  the  assembled  women,  and 
then  dropped  before  the  amaze  that  looked  at  him 
from  those  of  Miss  Carver.  The  porter  kept  roaring 
out  his  infamies. 

Berry  spoke  again. 

"  Mrs.  Harmon,  do  you  want  that  fellow  in  there  ?" 

"  No,  goodness  knows  I  don't,  Mr.  Berry." 


340  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"All  right."  Berry  swung  the  street-door  open 
with  his  left  hand,  and  seemed  with  the  same 
gesture  to  lay  his  clutch  upon  the  porter's  collar. 
"  Fire  him  out  myself! "  he  exclaimed,  and  with  a  few 
swiftly  successive  jerks  and  bumps  the  burly  shape 
of  the  porter  was  shot  into  the  night.  "  I  want  you 
to  get  me  an  officer,  Jerry,"  he  said,  putting  his  head 
out  after  him.  "  There  's  been  a  blackguard  makinr 
a  row  here.  Never  mind  your  hat  I  Go  ! " 

"  Oh,  my  good  gracious,  Mr.  Berry  1 "  gasped  Mrs. 
Harmon,  "  what  have  you  done  ?  " 

"If  it 's  back  pay,  Mrs.  Harmon,  we  '11  pass  round 
the  hat.  Don't  you  be  troubled.  That  fellow 
wasn't  fit  to  be  in  a  decent  house." 

Berry  stopped  a  moment  and  looked  at  Lemuel. 
The  art- students  did  not  look  at  him  at  all ;  they 
passed  on  upstairs  with  Berry. 

The  other  ladies  remained  to  question  and  to 
comment.  Mrs.  Harmon's  nephew,  to  whom  the 
uproar  seemed  to  have  penetrated  in  his  basement, 
came  up  and  heard  the  story  from  them.  He  was 
quite  decided.  He  said  that  Mr.  Berry  had  done 
right.  He  said  that  he  was  tired  of  having  folks 
damn  his  aunt  up  hill  and  down  dale  ;  and  that  if 
Jerry  had  kept  on  a  great  deal  longer,  he  would 
have  said  something  to  him  himself  about  it. 

The  ladies  justified  him  in  the  stand  he  took  ; 
they  returned  to  the  parlour  to  talk  it  all  over,  and  he 
went  back  to  his  basement.  Mrs.  Harmon,  in  tears, 
retired  to  her  room,  and  Lemuel  was  left  standing 
alone  in  hia  office.  The  mate  stole  softly  to  him 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     341 

from  the  background  of  the  elevator,  where  he  had 
kept  himself  in  safety  during  the  outbreak. 

"  Look  here,  mate.  This  thing  been  about  your 
ringin'  me  in  here  1 " 

"  Oh,  go  away,  go  away  ! "  Lemuel  huskily 
entreated. 

"  Well,  that 's  what  I  intend  to  do.  I  don't  want 
to  stay  here  and  git  you  into  no  more  trouble,  and  I 
know  that's  what's  been  done.  You  never  done  me  no 
harm,  and  I  don't  want  to  do  you  none.  I  'm  goin' 
right  up  to  your  room  to  git  my  clo'es,  and  then  I  '11 
skip." 

"  It  won't  do  any  good  now.  It  '11  only  make  it 
worse.  You  'd  better  stay  now.  You  must." 

"  "Well,  if  you  say  so,  mate." 

He  went  back  to  his  elevator,  and  Lemuel  sat 
down  at  his  desk,  and  dropped  his  face  upon  his 
arms  there.  Toward  eleven  o'clock  Evans  came  in 
and  looked  at  him,  but  without  speaking ;  he  must 
have  concluded  that  he  was  asleep;  he  went 
upstairs,  but  after  a  while  he  came  down  again  and 
stopped  again  at  the  office  door,  and  looked  in  on 
the  haggard  boy,  hesitating  as  if  for  the  best  words. 
"  Barker,  Mr.  Berry  has  been  telling  me  about  your 
difficulty  here.  I  know  all  about  you — from  Mr. 
Sewell."  Lemuel  stared  at  him.  "And  I  will  stand 
your  friend,  whatever  people  think.  And  I  don't 
blame  you  for  not  wanting  to  be  beaten  by  that 
ruffian ;  you  could  have  stood  no  chance  against 
him ;  and  if  you  had  thrashed  him  it  wouldn't  have 
been  a  great  triumph." 


342  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"  I  wish  he  had  killed  me,"  said  Lemuel  from  his 
dust-dry  throat. 

"  Oh  no ;  that 's  foolish,"  said  the  elder,  with 
patient,  sad  kindness.  "  Who  knows  whether  death 
is  the  end  of  trouble  ?  We  must  live  things  down, 
not  die  them  down."  He  put  his  arm  caressingly 
across  the  boy's  shoulder. 

"  I  can  never  live  this  down,"  said  Lemuel.  He 
added  passionately,  "  I  wish  I  could  die  !  " 

"  No,"  said  Evans.  "  You  must  cheer  up.  Think 
of  next  Saturday.  It  will  soon  be  here,  and  then 
you  '11  be  astonished  that  you  felt  so  bad  on 
Tuesday." 

He  gave  Lemuel  a  parting  pressure  with  his  arm, 
and  turned  to  go  upstairs. 

At  the  same  moment  the  figure  of  Mrs.  Harmon's 
nephew,  distracted,  violent,  burst  up  through  the 
door  leading  to  the  basement. 

"  Good  heavens  !  "  exclaimed  the  editor,  "  is  Mr. 
Harmon  going  to  kick  ? " 

"  The  house  is  on  fire  ! "  yelled  the  apparition. 

A  thick  cloud  of  smoke  gushed  out  of  the  elevator- 
shaft,  and  poured  into  the  hall,  which  it  seemed  to 
fill  instantly.  It  grew  denser,  and  in  another 
instant  a  wild  hubbub  began.  The  people  appeared 
from  every  quarter  and  ran  into  the  street,  where 
some  of  the  ladies  began  calling  up  at  the  windows 
to  those  who  were  still  in  their  rooms.  A  stout 
little  old  lady  came  to  an  open  window,  and  paid 
out  hand  over  hand  a  small  cable  on  which  she 
meant  to  descend  to  the  pavement ;  she  had  carried 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     343 

this  rope  about  with  her  many  years  against  the 
exigency  to  which  she  was  now  applying  it.  Within, 
the  halls  and  the  stairway  became  the  scene  of  frantic 
encounter  between  wives  and  husbands  rushing  down 
to  save  themselves,  and  then  rushing  back  to  save  their 
forgotten  friends.  Many  appeared  in  the  simple 
white  in  which  they  had  left  their  beds,  with  the 
addition  of  such  shawls  or  rugs  as  chance  suggested. 
A  house  was  opened  to  the  fugitives  on  the  other 
side  of  the  street,  and  the  crowd  that  had  collected 
could  not  repress  its  applause  when  one  of  them 
escaped  from  the  hotel-door  and  shot  across.  It 
applauded  impartially  men,  women,  and  children^ 
and,  absorbed  in  the  spectacle,  no  one  sounded  the 
fire-alarm ;  the  department  began  to  be  severely 
condemned  among  the  bystanders  before  the  engines 
appeared. 

Most  of  the  ladies,  in  their  escape  or  their  purpose 
of  rescue,  tried  each  to  possess  herself  of  Lemuel,  and 
keep  him  solely  in  her  interest.  "  Mr.  Barker  !  Mr. 
Barker  !  Mr.  Barker  ! :'  was  called  for  in  various  so 
pranos  and  contraltos,  till  an  outsider  took  up  the  cry 
and  shouted,  "  Barker  !  Barker  !  Speech  !  Speech ! " 
This  made  him  very  popular  with  the  crowd,  who  in 
their  enjoyment  of  the  fugitives  were  unable  to  regard 
the  fire  seriously.  A  momentary  diversion  was  caused 
by  an  elderly  gentleman  who  came  to  the  hotel-door, 
completely  dressed  except  that  he  was  in  his  stockings, 
and  demanded  Jerry.  The  humourist  who  had  called 
for  a  speech  from  Lemuel  volunteered  the  statement 
that  Jerry  had  just  gone  round  the  corner  to  see 


344  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

a  man.  "  I  want  him,"  said  the  old  gentleman 
savagely.  "  1  want  my  boots  ;  I  can't  go  about  in 
my  stockings." 

Cries  for  Jerry  followed ;  but  in  fact  the  porter 
had  forgotten  all  his  grudges  and  enmities  ;  he  had 
reappeared,  in  perfect  temper,  and  had  joined  Lemuel 
and  Berry  in  helping  to  get  the  women  and  children 
out  of  the  burning  house. 

The  police  had  set  a  guard  at  the  door,  in  whom 
Lemuel  recognised  the  friendly  old  officer  who  had 
arrested  him.  "  All  out  1 "  asked  the  policeman. 

The  smoke,  which  had  reddened  and  reddened, 
was  now  a  thin  veil  drawn  over  the  volume  of  flame 
that  burned  strongly  and  steadily  up  the  well  of  the 
elevator,  and  darted  its  tongues  out  to  lick  the  frame 
work  without.  The  heat  was  intense.  Mrs.  Harmon 
came  panting  and  weeping  from  the  dining-room  with 
some  unimportant  pieces  of  silver,  driven  forward  by 
Jerry  and  her  nephew. 

They  met  the  firemen,  come  at  last,  and  pulling 
in  their  hose,  who  began  to  play  upon  the  flames ; 
the  steam  filled  the  place  with  a  dense  mist. 

Lemuel  heard  Berry  ask  him  through  the  fog, 
"  Barker,  where  ;s  old  Evans  1 " 

11  Oh,  I  don't  know  !  "  he  lamented  back. 

"He  must  have  gone  up  to  get  Mrs.  Evans." 

He  made  a  dash  towards  the  stairs.  A  fireman 
caught  him  and  pulled  him  back.  "You  can't  go 
up ;  smoke  's  thick  as  hell  up  there."  But  Lemuel 
pulled  away,  and  shot  up  the  stairs.  He  heard  the  fire 
men  stop  Berry. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.    345 

"  You  can't  go,  I  tell  you !  Who  's  ruimin'  this 
fire  anyway,  I  'd  like  to  know  1 " 

He  ran  along  the  corridor  which  Evans's  apartment 
opened  upon.  There  was  not  much  smoke  there ;  it 
had  drawn  up  the  elevator-well,  as  if  in  a  chimney. 

He  burst  into  the  apartment  and  ran  to  the  inner 
room,  where  he  had  once  caught  a  glimpse  of  Mrs. 
Evans  sitting  by  the  window. 

Evans  stood  leaning  against  the  wall,  with  his  hand 
at  his  breast.  He  panted,  "  Help  her— help— 

"Where  is  she?  Where  is  she  2"  demanded 
Lemuel. 

She  came  from  an  alcove  in  the  room,  holding  a 
handkerchief  drenched  with  cologne  in  her  hand, 
which  she  passed  to  her  husband's  face.  "  Are  you 
better  now  1  Can  you  come,  dear  1  Rest  on  me  ! " 

"  I  'm— I  'm  all  right !  Go— go  !  I  can  get 
along— 

"I'll  go  when  you  go,"  said  Mrs.  Evans.  She 
turned  to  Lemuel.  "  Mr.  Evans  fainted  ;  but  he  is 
better  now."  She  took  his  hand  with  a  tender  tran 
quillity  that  ignored  all  danger  or  even  excitement, 
and  gently  chafed  it. 

"But  come — come  !  "  cried  Lemuel.  "Don't  you 
know  the  house  is  on  fire  1 " 

"  Yes,  I  know  it,"  she  replied.  "  We  must  get  Mr. 
Evans  down.  You  must  help  me."  Lemuel  had 
seldom  seen  her  before  ;  but  he  had  so  long  heard  and 
talked  of  her  hopeless  invalidism  that  she  was  like 
one  risen  from  the  dead,  in  her  sudden  strength  and 
courage,  and  he  stared  at  the  miracle  of  her  restora- 


346  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

tion.  It  was  she  who  claimed  and  bore  the  greater 
share  of  the  burden  in  getting  her  husband  away. 
He  was  helpless ;  but  in  the  open  air  he  caught  his 
breath  more  fully,  and  at  last  could  tremulously  find 
his  way  out  of  the  sympathetic  *  crowd.  "Get  a 
carriage,"  she  said  to  Lemuel ;  and  then  she  added, 
as  it  drove  up  and  she  gave  an  address,  "  I  can  man 
age  him  now." 

Evans  weakly  pressed  Lemuel's  hand  from  the  seat 
to  which  he  had  helped  him,  and  the  hack  drove 
away.  Lemuel  looked  crazily  after  it  a  moment,  and 
then  returned  to  the  burning  house. 

Berry  called  to  him  from  the  top  of  the  outside 
steps,  "Barker,  have  you  seen  that  partner  of 
yours  1 " 

Lemuel  ran  up  to  him.     "  No  ! " 

"  Well,  come  in  here.  The  elevator 's  dropped,  and 
they're  afraid  he  went  down  with  it." 

"  I  know  he  didn't  !  He  wouldn't  be  such  a 
fool ! " 

"  Well,  we  '11  know  when  they  get  the  fire  under." 

"  I  thought  I  saw  something  in  the  elevator,  and 

as  long  as  you  don't  know  where  he  is "  said  a 

fireman. 

"Well,"  said  Berry,  "if  you've  got  the  upper 
hands  of  this  thing,  I  'm  going  to  my  room  a  minute." 

Lemuel  followed  him  upstairs,  to  see  if  he  could 
find  Williams.  The  steam  had  ascended  and  filled 
the  upper  halls  ;  little  cascades  of  water  poured  down 
the  stairs,  falling  from  step  to  step ;  the  long  strips 
of  carpeting  in  the  corridors  swam  in  the  deluge 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  347 

which  the  hose  had  poured  into  the  building,  and  a 
rain  of  heavy  drops  burst  through  the  ceilings. 

Most  of  the  room-doors  stood  open,  as  the  people 
had  flung  them  wide  in  their  rush  for  life.  At  the 
door  of  Berry's  room  a  figure  appeared  which  he 
promptly  seized  by  the  throat. 

"  Don't  be  in  a  hurry  !  "  he  said,  as  he  pushed  it 
into  the  room.  "  I  want  to  see  you." 

It  was  Williams. 

"  I  want  to  see  what  you  've  got  in  your  pockets. 
Hold  on  to  him,  Barker." 

Lemuel  had  no  choice.  He  held  Williams  by  the 
arms  while  Berry  went  through  him,  as  he  called  the 
search.  He  found  upon  him  whatever  small  articles 
of  value  there  had  been  in  his  room. 

The  thief  submitted  without  a  struggle,  without  a 
murmur. 

Berry  turned  scornfully  to  Lemuel.  "This  a 
friend  of  yours,  Mr.  Barker  1 " 

Still  the  thief  did  not  speak,  but  he  looked  at 
Lemuel. 

"  Yes,"  he  dryly  gasped. 

"  Well  ! "  said  Berry,  staring  fiercely  at  him  for 
a  moment.  "If  it  wasn't  for  something  old  Evans 
said  to  me  about  you,  a  little  while  ago,  I  }d  hand 
you  both  over  to  the  police." 

Williams  seemed  to  bear  the  threat  with  philo 
sophic  resignation,  but  Lemuel  shrank  back  in  terror. 
Berry  laughed.  '* 

"Why,  you  are  his  pal.  Go  along!  I'll  get 
Jerry  to  attend  to  you." 


348  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

Lemuel  slunk  downstairs  with  Williams.  "  Look 
here,  mate,"  said  the  rogue ;  "  I  guess  I  ha'n't  used 
you  just  right." 

Lemuel  expected  himself  to  cast  the  thief  off  with 
bitter  rejection.  But  he  heard  himself  saying  hope 
lessly,  "  Go  away,  and  try  to  behave  yourself,"  and 
then  he  saw  the  thief  make  the  most  of  the  favour 
of  heaven  and  vanish  through  the  crowd. 

He  would  have  liked  to  steal  away  too ;  but  he 
remained,  and  began  mechanically  helping  again 
wherever  he  saw  help  needed.  By  and  by  Berry 
came  out ;  Lemuel  thought  that  he  would  tell  some 
policeman  to  arrest  him ;  but  he  went  away  without 
speaking  to  any  one. 

In  an  hour  the  firemen  had  finished  their  share  of 
the  havoc,  and  had  saved  the  building.  They  had 
kept  the  fire  to  the  elevator-shaft  and  the  adjoining 
wood-work,  and  but  for  the  water  they  had  poured 
into  the  place  the  ladies  might  have  returned  to  their 
rooms,  which  were  quite  untouched  by  the  flames. 
As  it  was,  Lemuel  joined  with  Jerry  in  fetching  such 
things  to  them  as  their  needs  or  fancies  suggested ; 
the  refugees  across  the  way  were  finally  clothed  by 
their  efforts,  and  were  able  to  quit  their  covert  indis 
tinguishable  in  dress  from  any  of  the  other  boarders. 

The  crowd  began  to  go  about  its  business.  The 
engines  had  disappeared  from  the  little  street  with 
exultant  shrieks ;  in  the  morning  the  insurance  com 
panies  would  send  their  workmen  to  sweep  out  the 
extinct  volcano,  and  mop  up  the  shrunken  deluge, 
preparatory  to  ascertaining  the  extent  of  the  damage 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  349 

done ;  in  the  meantime  the  police  kept  the  boys  and 
loafers  out  of  the  building,  and  the  order  that  begins 
to  establish  itself  as  soon  as  chaos  is  confessed  took 
possession  of  the  ruin. 

But  it  was  all  the  same  a  ruin  and  a  calamitous 
conclusion  for  the  time  being.  The  place  that  had 
been  in  its  grotesque  and  insufficient  fashion  a  home 
for  so  many  homeless  people  was  uninhabitable; 
even  the  Harmons  could  not  go  back  to  it.  The 
boarders  had  all  scattered,  but  Mrs.  Harmon  lingered, 
dwelling  volubly  upon  the  scene  of  disaster.  She 
did  not  do  much  else ;  she  was  not  without  a  just 
pride  in  it,  but  she  was  not  puffed  up  by  all  the 
sympathy  and  consolation  that  had  been  offered  her. 
She  thought  of  others  in  the  midst  of  her  own 
troubles,  and  she  said  to  Lemuel,  who  had  remained 
working  with  Jerry  under  her  direction  in  putting 
together  such  things  as  she  felt  she  must  take  away 
with  her — 

"  Well,  I  don't  know  as  I  feel  much  worse  about 
myself  than  I  do  about  poor  Mr.  Evans.  Why,  I  Ve  got 
the  ticket  in  my  pocket  now  that  he  gave  me  for  the 
Wednesday  matinee  !  I  do  wonder  how  he 's  gettin' 
along  !  I  guess  they  Ve  got  you  to  thank,  if  they  're 
alive  to  tell  the  tale.  What  did  you  do  to  get  that 
woman  out  alive  1 "  Lemuel  looked  blankly  at  her, 
and  did  not  answer.  "  And  Mr.  Evans  too  !  You 
must  have  had  your  hands  full,  and  that 's  what  I 
told  the  reporters ;  but  I  told  'em  I  guessed  you  'd 
be  equal  to  it  if  any  one  would.  Why,  I  don't  sup 
pose  Mrs.  Evans  has  been  out  of  her  room  for  a 


350  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE. 

month,  or  hardly  stepped  her  foot  to  the  floor. 
Well,  I  don't  want  to  see  many  people  look  as  he  did 
when  you  first  got  him  out  of  the  house." 

"  Well,  I  don't  know  as  I  want  to  see  many  more 
fires  where  I  live,"  said  her  nephew,  as  if  with  the 
wish  to  be  a  little  more  accurate. 

Jerry  asked  Lemuel  to  watch  Mrs.  Harmon's  goods 
while  he  went  for  a  carriage,  and  said  sir  to  him. 
It  seemed  to  Lemuel  that  this  respect,  and  Mrs. 
Harmon's  unmerited  praises,  together  with  the  doom 
that  was  secretly  upon  him,  would  drive  him  wild. 


XXIV. 

THE  evening  after  the  fire  Mrs.  Sewell  sat  talking 
it  over  with  her  husband,  in  the  light  of  the  news 
paper  reports,  which  made  very  much  more  of 
Lemuel's  part  in  it  than  she  liked.  The  reporters  had 
flattered  the  popular  love  of  the  heroic  in  using  Mrs. 
Harmon's  version  of  his  exploits,  and  represented 
him  as  having  been  most  efficient  and  daring 
throughout,  and  especially  so  in  regard  to  the 
Evanses. 

"  Well,  that  doesn't  differ  materially  from  what 
they  told  us  themselves,"  said  Sewell. 

"You know  very  well,  David,"  retorted  his  wife, 
"  that  there  couldn't  have  been,  the  least  danger  at 
any  time  ;  and  when  he  helped  her  to  get  Mr.  Evans 
downstairs,  the  fire  was  nearly  all  out." 

"  Very  well,  then  ;  he  would  have  saved  their  lives 
if  it  had  been  necessary.  It  was  a  case  of  potential 
heroism,  that  contained  all  the  elements  of  self- 
sacrifice." 

Mrs.  Sewell  could  not  deny  this,  but  she  was  not 
satisfied.  She  was  silent  a  moment  before  she 
asked,  "What  do  you  suppose  that  wretched 
creature  will  do  now  1 " 

£51 


352  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"I  think  very  likely  he  will  come  to  me," 
answered  Sewell. 

"I  dare  say."  The  bell  rang.  "And  I  suppose 
that 's  he  now  !  " 

They  listened  and  heard  Miss  Vane's  voice  at  the 
door,  asking  for  them. 

Mrs.  Sewell  ran  down  the  stairs  and  kissed  her. 
"  Oh,  I  'm  so  glad  you  came.  Isn't  it  wonderful  ? 
I  've  just  come  from  them,  and  she 's  taking  the 
whole  care  of  him,  as  if  he  had  always  been  the  sick 
one,  and  she  strong  and  well." 

"  What  do  you  mean,  Lucy  1     He  isn't  ill ! " 

"  Who  isn't  ?  " 

"  What  are  you  talking  about  ?  " 

"  About  Mr.  Evans " 

"  Oh  ! "  said  Miss  Vane,  with  cold  toleration. 
She  arrived  at  the  study  door  and  gave  Sewell  her 
hand.  "I  scarcely  knew  him,  you  know;  I  only 
met  him  casually  here.  I  've  come  to  see,"  she  added 
nervously,  "if  you  know  where  Lemuel  is,  Mr. 
Sewell.  Have  you  seen  anything  of  him  since  the 
fire  1  How  nobly  he  behaved  !  But  I  never  saw 
anything  he  wasn't  equal  to  !  " 

"  Mrs.  Sewell  objects  to  his  saving  human  life," 
said  Sewell,  not  able  to  deny  himself. 

"  I  don't  see  how  you  can  take  the  slightest 
interest  in  him,"  began  Mrs.  Sewell,  saying  a  little 
more  than  she  meant. 

"  You  would,  my  dear,"  returned  Miss  Vane,  "  if 
you  had  wronged  him  as  I  have." 

"  Or  as  I,"  said  Sewell. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  353 

'I'm  thankful  I  haven't,  then,"  said  his  wife. 
"  It  seems  to  me  that  there 's  nothing  else  of  him. 
As  to  his  noble  behaviour,  it  isn't  possible  you  be 
lieve  those  newspaper  accounts  1  He  didn't  save 
any  one's  life  ;  there  was  no  danger  ! " 

Miss  Vane,  preoccupied  with  her  own  ideal  of  the 
facts,  stared  at  her  without  replying,  and  then  turned 
to  Sewell. 

"  I  want  to  find  him  and  ask  him  to  stay  with  me 
till  he  can  get  something  else  to  do."  Sewell's  eye 
brows  arched  themselves  involuntarily.  "  Sibyl  has 
gone  to  New  York  for  a  fortnight ;  I  shall  be  quite 
alone  in  the  house,  and  I  shall  be  very  glad  of  his 
company,"  she  explained  to  the  eyebrows,  while 
ignoring  them.  Her  chin  quivered  a  little,  as  she 
added,  "  I  shall  be  proud  of  his  company.  I  wish 
him  to  understand  that  he  is  my  guest." 

"I  suppose  I  shall  see  him  soon,"  said  Sewell, 
"  and  I  will  give  him  your  message." 

"  Will  you  tell  him,"  persisted  Miss  Vane,  a  little 
hysterically,  "  that  if  he  is  in  any  way  embarrassed, 
I  insist  upon  his  coming  to  me  immediately — at 
once  ?  " 

Sewell  smiled,  "  Yes." 

"I  know  that  I'm  rather  ridiculous,"  said  Miss 
Vane,  smiling  in  sympathy,  "  and  I  don't  blame 
Mrs.  Sewell  for  not  entering  into  my  feelings.  No 
body  could,  who  hadn't  felt  the  peculiar  Lemuel- 
glamour." 

"  I  don't  imagine  he  's  embarrassed  in  any  way,'' 
said  SewelL  "  He  seems  to  have  the  gift  of  lighting 
z 


354  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

on  his  feet.  But  1 11  tell  him  how  peremptory  you 
are,  Miss  Vane." 

"  Well,  upon  my  word,"  cried  Mrs.  Sewell,  when 
Miss  Vane  had  taken  leave  of  them  in  an  exaltation 
precluding  every  recurrent  attempt  to  enlighten  her 
as  to  the  true  proportions  of  Lemuel's  part  in  the 
fire,  "  I  really  believe  people  like  to  be  made  fools 
of.  Why  didn't  you  tell  her,  David,  that  he  had 
done  nothing  1 " 

"What  would  have  been  the  use  1  She  has  her 
own  theory  of  the  affair.  Besides,  he  did  do  some 
thing ;  he  did  his  duty,  and  my  experience  is  that 
it 's  no  small  thing  to  do.  It  wasn't  his  fault  that  he 
didn't  do  more." 

He  waited  some  days  for  Lemuel  to  come  to  him, 
and  he  inquired  each  time  he  went  to  see  the 
Evanses  if  they  knew  where  he  was.  But  they  had 
not  heard  of  him  since  the  night  of  the  fire. 

"  It 's  his  shyness,"  said  Evans  ;  "  I  can  understand 
how  if  he  thought  he  had  put  me  under  an  obliga 
tion  he  wouldn't  come  near  me — and  couldn't." 

Evans  was  to  go  out  of  town  for  a  little  while  ; 
the  proprietors  of  the  Saturday  Afternoon  insisted 
upon  his  taking  a  rest,  and  they  behaved  handsomely 
about  his  salary.  He  did  not  want  to  go,  but  his 
wife  got  him  away  finally,  after  he  had  failed  in  two 
or  three  attempts  at  writing. 

Lemuel  did  not  appear  to  Sewell  till  the  evening  of 
the  day  when  the  Evanses  left  town.  It  seemed  as  if 
he  had  waited  till  they  were  gone,  so  that  he  could 
not  be  urged  to  visit  them.  At  first  the  minister 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  355 

scolded  him  a  little  for  his  neglect ;  but  Lemuel 
said  he  had  heard  about  them,  and  knew  they  were 
getting  along  all  right.  He  looked  as  if  he  had  not 
been  getting  along  very  well  himself;  his  face  was  thin, 
and  had  an  air  at  once  dogged  and  apprehensive. 
He  abruptly  left  talking  of  Evans,  and  said,  "  I  don't 
know  as  you  heard  what  happened  that  night  before 
the  fire  just  after  I  got  back  from  your  house  1 " 

"No,  I  hadn't." 

Lemuel  stopped.  Then  he  related  briefly  and 
clearly  the  whole  affair,  Sewell  interrupting  him 
from  time  to  time  with  murmurs  of  sympathy,  and 
"  Tchk,  tchk,  tchk  !  "  and  "  Shocking,  shocking  !  " 
At  the  end  he  said,  "  I  had  hoped  somehow  that  the 
general  calamity  had  swallowed  up  your  particular 
trouble  in  it.  Though  I  don't  know  that  general 
calamities  ever  do  that  with  particular  troubles,"  he 
added,  more  to  himself  than  to  Lemuel ;  and  he  put 
the  idea  away  for  some  future  sermon. 

"  Mr.  Evans  stopped  and  said  something  to  me 
that  night.  He  said  we  had  to  live  things  down, 
and  not  die  them  down ;  he  wanted  I  should  wait 
till  Saturday  before  I  was  sure  that  I  couldn't  get 
through  Tuesday.  He  said,  How  did  we  know 
that  death  was  the  end  of  trouble  ? " 

"  Yes,"  said  the  minister,  with  a  smile  of  fondness 
for  his  friend  ;  "that  was  like  Evans  all  over." 

"  I  sha'n't  forget  those  things,"  said  Lemuel. 
"  They  Ve  been  in  my  head  ever  since.  If  it  hadn't 
been  for  them,  I  don't  know  what  I  should  have 
done." 


356  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

He  stopped,  and  after  a  moment's  inattention 
Sewell  perceived  that  he  wished  to  be  asked  some 
thing  more.  "I  hope,"  he  said,  "that  nothing 
more  has  been  going  wrong  with  you  ? "  and  as 
he  asked  this  he  laid  his  hand  affectionately  on  the 
young  man's  shoulder,  just  as  Evans  had  done. 
Lemuel's  eyes  dimmed  and  his  breath  thickened. 
"  What  has  become  of  the  person — the  discharged 
convict  ? " 

"I  guess  I  had  better  tell  you,"  he  said;  and 
he  told  him  of  the  adventure  with  Berry  and 
Williams. 

Sewell  listened  in  silence,  and  then  seemed  quite 
at  a  loss  what  to  say ;  but  Lemuel  saw  that  he  M*as 
deeply  afflicted.  At  last  he  asked,  lifting  his  eyes 
anxiously  to  Sewell's,  "  Do  you  think  I  did  wrong  to 
say  the  thief  was  a  friend  of  mine,  and  get  him 
off  that  way  ?  " 

"That's  a  very  difficult  question,"  sighed  Sewell. 
'You  had  a  duty  to  society." 

"  Yes,  I  've  thought  of  that  since  !  " 

"  If  I  had  been  in  your  place,  I  'm  afraid  I  should 
be  glad  not  to  have  thought  of  it  in  time ;  and  I  'm 
afraid  I  'm  glad  that,  as  it  is,  it 's  too  late.  But 
doesn't  it  involve  you  with  him  in  the  eyes  of  the 
other  young  man  ?  " 

"Yes,  I  presume  it  does,"  said  Lemuel.  "I  shall 
have  to  go  away." 

"Back  to  Willoughby  Pastures?"  asked  Sewell, 
with  not  so  much  faith  in  that  panacea  for  Lemuel's 
troubles  as  he  had  once  had. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     357 

"No,  to  some  other  town.  Do  you  know  of 
anything  I  could  get  to  do  in  New  York  1 " 

"  Oh,  no,  no  !  "  said  the  minister.  "You  needn't 
let  this  banish  you.  We  must  seek  this  young 
Mr.- 

"  Berry." 

" Mr.  Berry  out,  and  explain  the  matter  to 

him." 

"Then  you  11  have  to  tell  him  all  about  me  1 " 

"Yes.     Why  not?" 

Lemuel  was  silent,  and  looked  down. 

"  In  the  meantime,"  pursued  the  minister,  "  1 
have  a  message  for  you  from  Miss  Yane.  She  has 
heard,  as  we  all  have,  of  your  behaviour  during  the 
fire " 

"  It  wasn't  anything,"  Lemuel  interrupted. 
" There  wasn't  the  least  danger;  and  Mrs.  Evans 
did  it  all  herself,  anyway.  It  made  me  sick  to 
see  how  the  papers  had  it.  It 's  a  shame  ! " 

Sewell  smiled.  "  I  'm  afraid  you  couldn't  make 
Miss  Yane  think  so ;  but  I  can  understand  what  you 
mean.  She  has  never  felt  quite  easy  about  the  way 
— the  terms — on  which  she  parted  with  you.  She 
has  spoken  to  me  several  times  of  it,  and — ah — 
expressed  her  regret;  and  now,  knowing  that  you 
have  been — interrupted  in  your  life,  she  is  anxious 
to  have  you  come  to  her " 

An  angry  flash  lighted  up  Lemuel's  face. 

"I  couldn't  go  back  there  !  I  wouldn't  do  any 
such  work  again." 

"I  don't  mean  that,"   Sewell   hastened   to   say 


358  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"  Miss  Vane  wished  me  to  ask  you  to  come  as  her 
guest  until  you  could  find  something — Miss  Sibyl 
Vane  has  gone  to  New  York " 

"I'm  very  much  obliged  to  her,  said  Lemuel, 
"but  I  shouldn't  want  to  give  her  so  much  trouble, 
or  any  one.  I — I  liked  her  very  much,  and  I 
shouldn't  want  she  should  think  I  didn't  appre 
ciate  her  invitation." 

"  I  will  tell  her,"  said  the  minister.  "  I  had  no 
great  hope  you  would  see  your  way  to  accepting 
it.  But  she  will  be  glad  to  know  that  you  received 
it."  He  added,  rather  interrogatively  than  affirm 
atively,  "  In  the  right  spirit." 

"Oh  yes,"  said  Lemuel.  "Please  to  tell  her  I 
did." 

"  Thank  you,"  said  Sewell,  with  bland  vagueness. 
"I  don't  know  that  I've  asked  yet  where  you  are 
staying  at  present  ?  " 

"I'm  at  Mrs.  Nash's,  13  Canary  Place.  Mrs. 
Harmon  went  there  first." 

"  Oh  !  And  are  you  looking  forward  to  rejoining 
her  in  a  new  place  ? " 

"I  don't  know  as  I  am.  I  don't  know  as  I 
should  want  to  go  into  an  hotel  again." 

Sewell  manifested  a  little  embarrassment.  "  Well, 
you  won't  forget  your  promise  to  let  me  be  of  use  to 
you — pecuniarily,  if  you  should  be  in  need  of  a  small 
advance  at  any  time." 

"  Oh  no  !  But  I  've  got  enough  money  for  a 
while  yet — till  I  can  get  something  to  do."  He 
rose,  and  after  a  moment's  hesitation  he  said,  "I 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  359 

don't  know  as  I  want  you  should  say  anything  to  that 
fellow  about  me.  To  Mr.  Berry,  I  mean." 

"Oh!  certainly  not,"  said  Sewell,  "if  you  don't 
wish  it." 

Whatever  it  was  in  that  reticent  and  elusive  soul 
which  prompted  his  request,  the  minister  now  felt 
that  he  could  not  know  ;  but  perhaps  the  pang  that 
Lemuel  inflicted  on  himself  had  as  much  transport 
as  anguish  in  it.  He  believed  that  he  had  for 
ever  cut  himself  off  from  the  companionship  that 
seemed  highest  and  holiest  on  earth  to  him  ;  he 
should  never  see  that  girl  again ;  Berry  must  have 
told  Miss  Swan,  and  long  before  this  Miss  Carver  had 
shuddered  at  the  thought  of  him  as  the  accomplice 
of  a  thief.  But  he  proudly  said  to  himself  that  he 
must  let  it  all  go  ;  for  if  he  had  not  been  a  thief,  he 
had  been  a  beggar  and  a  menial,  he  had  come  out  of 
a  hovel  a£  home,  and  his  mother  went  about  like  a 
scarecrow,  and  it  mattered  little  what  kind  of  shame 
she  remembered  him  in. 

He  thought  of  her  perpetually  now,  and,  in  those 
dialogues  which  we  hold  in  reverie  with  the  people  we 
think  much  about,  he  talked  with  her  all  day  long. 
At  first,  when  he  began  to  do  this,  it  seemed  a  wrong 
to  Statira ;  but  now,  since  the  other  was  lost  to  him 
beyond  other  approach,  he  gave  himself  freely  up  to 
the  mystical  colloquies  he  held  with  her,  as  the  de 
votee  abandons  himself  to  imagined  converse  with  a 
saint.  Besides,  if  he  was  in  love  with  Statira,  he  was 
not  in  love  with  Jessie ;  that  he  had  made  clear  to  him 
self  ;  for  his  feeling  toward  her  was  wholly  different. 


360  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

Most  of  the  time,  in  these  communings,  he  was  with 
her  in  her  own  home,  down  at  Corbitant,  where  he 
fancied  she  had  gone,  after  the  catastrophe  at  the  St. 
Albans,  and  he  sat  there  with  her  on  a  porch  at  the 
front  door,  which  she  had  once  described  to  him,  and 
looked  out  under  the  silver  poplars  at  the  vessels  in 
the  bay.  He  formed  himself  some  image  of  it  all 
from  pictures  of  the  seaside  which  he  had  seen ;  and 
there  were  times  when  he  tried  to  go  back  with  her 
into  the  life  she  had  led  there  as  a  child.  Perhaps 
his  ardent  guesses  at  this  were  as  near  reality  as 
anything  that  could  be  made  to  appear,  for,  after  her 
mother  and  brothers  and  sisters  had  died  out  of  the 
wide  old  house,  her  existence  there  was  as  lonely  as 
if  she  had  been  a  little  ghost  haunting  it.  She  had 
inherited  her  mother's  temperament  with  her  father's 
constitution ;  she  was  the  child  born  to  his  last  long 
absence  at  sea  and  her  mother's  last  solitude  at 
home.  When  he  returned,  he  found  his  wife  dead 
and  his  maiden  sister  caring  for  the  child  in  the 
desolate  house. 

This  sister  of  Captain  Carver's  had  been  dis 
appointed,  as  the  phrase  is,  when  a  young  girl  • 
another  girl  had  won  her  lover  from  her.  Her  dis 
appointment  had  hardened  her  to  the  perception  of 
the  neighbours ;  and,  by  a  strange  perversion  of  the 
sympathies  and  faculties,  she  had  turned  from  gossip 
and  censure,  from  religion,  and  from  all  the  sources 
of  comfort  that  the  bruised  heart  of  Corbitant 
naturally  turned  to,  and  found  such  consolation  as 
came  to  her  in  books,  that  is  to  say  romances,  and 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.    361 

especially  the  romances  that  celebrated  and  deified 
such  sorrow  as  her  own.  She  had  been  a  pretty 
little  thing  when  young,  and  Jessie  remembered  her 
as  pretty  in-  her  early  old  age.  At  heart  she  must 
still  have  been  young  when  her  hair  was  grey,  for 
she  made  a  friend  and  companion  of  the  child,  and 
they  fed  upon  her  romances  together.  When  the 
aunt  died,  the  child,  who  had  known  no  mother  but 
her,  was  stricken  with  a  grief  so  deep  and  wild  that 
at  first  her  life  and  tfien  her  mind  was  feared  for. 
To  get  her  away  from  the  associations  and  influences 
of  the  place,  her  father  sent  her  to  school  in  the 
western  part  of  the  State,  where  she  met  Madeline 
Swan,  and  formed  one  of  those  friendships  which 
are  like  passions  between  young  girls.  During  her 
long  absence,  her  father  married  again  •  and  she  was 
called  home  to  his  deathbed.  He  was  dead  when 
she  arrived;  he  had  left  a  will  that  made  her 
dependent  on  her  stepmother.  When  Madeline 
Swan  wrote  to  announce  that  she  was  coming  to 
Boston  to  study  art,  Jessie  Carver  had  no  trouble  in 
arranging  with  her  stepmother,  by  the  sacrifice  of  her 
final  claim  on  her  father's  estate,  to  join  her  friend 
there,  with  a  little  sum  of  money  on  which  she  was 
to  live  till  she  should  begin  to  earn  something. 

Her  life  had  been  a  series  of  romantic  episodes ; 
Madeline  said  that  if  it  could  be  written  out  it  would 
be  fascinating  ;  but  she  went  to  work  very  practically, 
and  worked  hard.  She  had  not  much  feeling  for 
colour ;  but  she  drew  better  than  her  friend,  and  what 
she  hoped  to  do  was  to  learn  to  illustrate  books. 


362  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE. 

One  evening,  after  a  day  of  bitter-sweet  reveries  of 
Jessie,  Lemuel  went  to  see  Statira.  She  and  'Manda 
Grier  were  both  very  gay,  and  made  him  very 
welcome.  They  had  tea  for  him ;  Statira  tried  all 
her  little  arts,  and  'Manda  Grier  told  some  things 
that  had  happened  in  the  box-factory.  He  could  not 
help  laughing  at  them  ;  they  were  really  very  funny  ; 
but  he  felt  somehow  that  it  was  all  a  preparation 
for  something  else.  At  last  the  two  girls  made  a  set 
at  him,  as  'Manda  Grier  called  it,  and  tried  to  talk 
him  into  their  old  scheme  of  going  to  wait  on  table 
at  some  of  the  country  hotels,  or  the  seaside.  They 
urged  that  now,  while  he  was  out  of  a  place,  it  was 
just  the  time  to  look  up  a  chance. 

He  refused,  at  first  kindly,  and  at  last  angrily ;  and 
he  would  have  gone  away  in  this  mood  if  Statira  had 
not  said  that  she  would  never  say  another  word  to 
him  about  it,  and  hung  upon  his  neck,  while  'Manda 
Grier  looked  on  in  sullen  resentment.  He  came 
away  sick  and  heavy  at  heart.  He  said  to  himself 
that  they  would  be  willing  to  drag  him  into  the  mire  ; 
they  had  no  pride  ;  they  had  no  sense  ;  they  did  not 
know  anything  and  they  could  not  learn.  He  tried 
to  get  away  from  them  to  Miss  Carver  in  his 
thoughts ;  but  the  place  where  he  had  left  her  was 
vacant,  and  he  could  not  conjure  her  back.  Out  of 
the  void,  he  was  haunted  by  a  look  of  grieving 
reproach  and  wonder  from  her  eyes. 


XXV. 

THAT  evening  Sewell  went  to  see  an  old  parish 
ioner  of  his  who  lived  on  the  Hill,  and  who  among 
his  eccentricities  had  the  habit  of  occupying  his  city 
house  all  summer  long,  while  his  family  flitted  with 
other  people  of  fashion  to  the  seashore.  That  year 
they  talked  of  taking  a  cottage  for  the  first  time 
since  they  had  sold  their  own  cottage  at  Nahant, 
in  a  day  of  narrow  things  now  past.  The  ladies 
urged  that  he  ought  to  come  with  them,  and  not 
think  of  staying  in  Boston  now  that  he  had  a  trouble 
of  the  eyes  which  had  befallen  him,  and  Boston 
would  be  so  dull  if  he  could  not  get  about  freely 
and  read  as  usual. 

He  answered  that  he  would  rather  be  blind  in 
Boston  than  telescopic  at  Beverly,  or  any  other 
summer  resort ;  and  that  as  for  the  want  of  proper 
care,  which  they  urged,  he  did  not  think  he  should 
lack  in  his  own  house,  if  they  left  him  where  he 
could  reach  a  bell.  His  youngest  daughter,  a  lively 
little  blonde,  laughed  with  a  cousin  of  his  wife's  who 
was  present,  and  his  wife  decorously  despaired.  The 
discussion  of  the  topic  was  rather  premature,  for 
they  were  not  thinking  of  going  to  Beverly  before 


364  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

the  middle  of  May,  if  they  took  the  cottage  ;  but  an 
accident  had  precipitated  it,  and  they  were  having  it 
out,  as  people  do,  each  party  in  the  hope  that  the 
other  would  yield  if  kept  at  long  enough  before  the 
time  of  final  decision  came. 

"  Do  you  think,"  said  the  husband  and  father,  who 
looked  a  whimsical  tyrant  at  the  worst,  but  was 
probably  no  easier  to  manage  for  his  whimsicality, 
"  that  I  am  going  to  fly  in  the  face  of  prosperity,  and 
begin  to  do  as  other  people  wish  because  I  'm  pecu 
niarily  able  to  do  as  I  please  1 " 

The  little  blonde  rose  decisively  from  the  low 
chair  where  she  had  been  sitting.  "If  papa  has 
begun  to  reason  about  it,  we  may  as  well  yield  the 
point  for  the  present,  mamma.  Come,  Lily  !  Let 
us  leave  him  to  Cousin  Charles." 

"  Oh,  but  I  say  !  "  cried  Cousin  Charles,  "  if  I  'm  to 
stay  and  fight  it  out  with  him,  I  Ve  got  to  know 
which  side  I'm  on." 

"  You  're  on  the  right  side,"  said  the  young  lady 
over  her  shoulder;  "you  always  are,  Cousin 
Charles." 

Cousin  Charles,  in  the  attempt  to  kiss  his  hand  to 
ward  his  flatterer,  pulled  his  glasses  off  his  nose  by 
their  cord.  "Bromfield,"  he  said,  "I  don't  see  but 
this  commits  me  against  you."  And  then,  the  ladies 
having  withdrawn,  the  two  men  put  on  that  business 
air  with  which  our  sex  tries  to  atone  to  itself  for 
having  unbent  to  the  lighter  minds  of  the  other; 
heaven  knows  what  women  do  when  the  men  with 
whom  they  have  been  talking  go  away. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  365 

"  If  you  should  happen  to  stay  in  town,"  con 
tinued  the  cousin  treacherously,  "I  shall  be  very 
glad,  for  I  don't  know  but  I  shall  be  here  the  greater 
part  of  the  summer  myself." 

"  I  shall  stay,"  said  the  other,  "but  there  won't  be 
anything  casual  about  it." 

"  What  do  you  hear  from  Tom  ? "  asked  the 
cousin,  feeling  about  on  the  mantel  for  a  match. 
He  was  a  full-bodied,  handsome,  amiable-looking  old 
fellow,  whose  breath  came  in  quick  sighs  with  this 
light  exertion.  He  had  a  blond  complexion,  and 
what  was  left  of  his  hair,  a  sort  of  ethereal  down  on 
the  top  of  his  head,  and  some  cherished  fringes  at 
the  temples,  was  turning  the  yellowish  grey  that 
blond  hair  becomes. 

The  other  gentleman,  stretched  at  ease  in  a  deep 
chair,  with  one  leg  propped  on  a  cricket,  had  the  dis 
tinction  of  long  forms,  which  the  years  had  left  in 
their  youthful  gracility;  his  snow-white  moustache 
had  been  allowed  to  droop  over  the  handsome  mouth, 
whose  teeth  were  beginning  to  go.  "  They  're  on 
the  other  side  of  the  clock,"  he  said,  referring  to  the 
matches.  He  added,  with  another  glance  at  his 
relative,  "  Charles,  you  ought  to  bant.  It 's  begin 
ning  to  affect  your  wind." 

"  Beginning  f  Your  memory 's  going,  Bromfield. 
But  they  say  there  's  a  new  system  that  allows  you 
to  eat  everything.  I  'm  waiting  for  that.  In  the 
meantime,  I  Ve  gone  back  to  my  baccy." 

"They've  cut  mine  off,"  sighed  the  other. 
"  Doesn't  it  affect  your  heart  1 " 


366  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"  Not  a  bit.  But  what  do  you  do,  now  you  can't 
smoke  and  your  eyes  have  given  out  1 " 

"  I  bore  myself.  I  had  a  letter  from  Tom  yester 
day,"  said  the  sufferer,  returning  to  the  question  that 
his  cousin's  obesity  had  diverted  him  from.  "  He  's 
coming  on  in  the  summer." 

"  Tom 's  a  lucky  fellow,"  said  the  cousin.  "  I 
wish  you  had  insisted  on  my  taking  some  of  that 
stock  of  his  when  you  bought  in." 

"  Yes,  you  made  a  great  mistake,"  said  the  other, 
with  whimsical  superiority.  "You  should  have 
taken  my  advice.  You  would  now  be  rolling  in 
riches,  as  I  am,  with  a  much  better  figure  for  it." 

The  cousin  smoked  a  while.  "  Do  you  know,  I 
think  Tom's  about  the  best  fellow  I  ever  knew." 

"  He 's  a  good  boy,"  said  the  other,  with  the 
accent  of  a  father's  pride  and  tenderness. 

"  Going  to  bring  his  pretty  chickens  and  their 
dam  1  "  asked  the  cousin,  parting  his  coat-skirts  to 
the  genial  influence  of  the  fire. 

"No ;  it's  a  short  visit.  They  're  going  into  the 
Virginia  mountains  for  the  summer/'  A  man 
servant  came  in  and  said  something  in  a  low  voice. 
"Heigh?  What?  Why,  of  course!  Certainly! 
By  all  means  !  Show  him  in  !  Come  in,  parson ; 
come  in  ! "  called  the  host  to  his  yet  unseen  visitor, 
and  he  held  out  his  hand  for  Sewell  to  take  when  he 
appeared  at  the  door.  "  Glad  to  see  you  !  I  can't 
get  up, — a  little  gouty  to-day, — but  Bellingham's  on 
foot.  His  difficulty  is  sitting  down." 

Bellingham  gave  the  minister  a  near-sighted  man's 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  367 

glare  through  his  glasses,  and  then  came  eagerly 
forward  and  shook  hands.  "  Oh,  Mr.  Sewell  !  I 
hope  you  Ve  come  to  put  up  some  job  on  Corey. 
Don't  spare  him  !  With  Kanawha  Paint  Co.  at  the 
present  figures  he  merits  any  demand  that  Christian 
charity  can  make  upon  him.  The  man's  prosperity 
is  disgraceful." 

"  I  'in  glad  to  find  you  here,  Mr.  Bellingham," 
said  Sewell,  sitting  down. 

"  Oh,  is  it  double-barrelled  ?  "  pleaded  Bellingham. 

"  I  don't  know  that  it 's  a  deadly  weapon  of  any 
kind,"  returned  the  minister.  "  But  if  one  of  vou 
can't  help  me,  perhaps  the  other  can." 

"  Well,  let  us  know  what  the  job  is,"  said  Corey. 
"We  refuse  to  commit  ourselves  beforehand." 

"  I  shall  have  to  begin  at  the  beginning,"  said 
Sewell  warningly,  "  and  the  beginning  is  a  long 
way  off." 

"No  matter,"  said  Bellingham  adventurously. 
11  The  further  off,  the  better.  I  Ve  been  dining  with 
Corey — he  gives  you  a  very  good  dinner  now,  Corey 
does — and  I  'm  just  in  the  mood  for  a  deserving 
case." 

"The  trouble  with  Sewell  is,"  said  Corey,  "  that 
he  doesn't  always  take  the  trouble  to  have  them 
deserving.  I  hope  this  is  interesting,  at  least." 

"  I  suspect  you  '11  find  it  more  interesting  than 
I  shall, "  said  the  minister,  inwardly  preparing 
himself  for  the  amusement  which  Lemuel's  history 
always  created  in  his  hearers.  It  seemed  to  him,  as 
he  began,  that  he  was  always  telling  this  story,  and 


368  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

that  his  part  in  the  affair  was  always  becoming  less 
and  less  respectable.  No  point  was  lost  upon  his 
hearers;  they  laughed  till  the  ladies  in  the  drawing- 
room  above  wondered  what  the  joke  could  be. 

"At  any  rate,"  said  Bellingham,  "the  fellow 
behaved  magnificently  at  the  fire.  I  read  the 
accounts  of  it." 

"  I  think  his  exploits  owe  something  to  the  ima 
gination  of  the  reporters,"  said  Sewell.  "  He  tells  a 
different  story  himself." 

"  Oh,  of  course  !  "  said  Bellingham. 

*'  Well ;  and  what  else  ?  "  asked  Corey. 

"  There  isn't  any  more.  Simply  he 's  out  of  work, 
and  wants  something  to  do — anything  to  do— --any 
thing  that  isn't  menial." 

"Ah,  that's  a  queer  start  of  his,"  said  Bellingham 
thoughtfully.  « I  don't  know  but  I  like  that." 

"And  do  you  come  to  such  effete  posterity  as 
we  are  for  help  in  a  case  like  that  1 "  demanded 
Corey.  "  Why,  the  boy 's  an  Ancestor  !  " 

"  So  he  is  !  Why,  so  he  is— so  he  is  !  "  said  Bel 
lingham,  with  delight  in  the  discovery.  "  Of  course 
he  is  ! " 

"  All  you  have  to  do,"  pursued  Corey,  "  is  to 
give  him  time,  and  he'll  found  a  fortune  and  a 
family,  and  his  children's  children  will  be 
cutting  ours  in  society.  Half  of  our  great  people 
have  come  up  in  that  way.  Look  at  the  Blue-book, 
where  our  nobility  is  enrolled  ;  it 's  the  apotheosis 
of  farm-boys,  mechanics,  insidemen,  and  I  don't 
know  what ! " 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     369 

"But  in  the  meantime  this  ancestor  is  now  so 
remote  that  he  has  nothing  to  do,"  suggested 
Sewell.  "  If  you  give  him  time  you  kill  him." 

"  Well,  what  do  you  want  me  to  do  1  Mrs.  Corey 
is  thinking  of  setting  up  a  Buttons.  But  you  say 
this  boy  has  a  soul  above  buttons.  And  besides,  he  Js 
too  old." 

"Yes." 

"  Look  here,  Bromfield,"  said  Bellingham,  "  why 
don't  you  get  him  to  read  to  you  1  " 

Corey  glanced  from  his  cousin  to  the  minister, 
whose  face  betrayed  that  this  was  precisely  what  he 
had  had  in  his  own  mind. 

"  Is  that  the  job  1  "  asked  Corey. 

Sewell  nodded  boldly. 

"  He  would  read  through  his  nose,  wouldn't  he  ? 
I  couldn't  stand  that.  I  Ve  stopped  talking  through 
mine,  you  know." 

"Why,  look  here,  Bromfield!"  said  Bellingham 
for  the  second  time.  "Why  don't  you  let  me 
manage  this  affair  for  you  ?  I  'm  not  of  much  use 
in  the  world,  but  from  time  to  time  I  like  to  do  my 
"poor  best ;  and  this  is  just  one  of  the  kind  of  things 
I  think  I'm  fitted  for.  I  should  like  to  see  this 
young  man.  When  I  read  in  the  newspapers  of 
some  fellow  who  has  done  a  fine  thing,  I  always 
want  to  see  what  manner  of  man  he  is ;  and  I  'm 
glad  of  any  chance  that  throws  him  in  my  way." 

"  Your  foible  's  notorious,  Charles.  But  I  don't 
see  why  you  keep  my  cigars  all  to  yourself,"  said 
Corey. 

2  A 


370  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

"My  dear  fellow,"  said  Bellingham,  making  a 
hospitable  offer  of  the  cigar-box  from  the  mantel, 
"you  said  they'd  cut  you  off." 

"Ah,  so  they  have.  I  forgot.  Well,  what's  your 
plan  ? " 

"My  plan,"  said  Bellingham,  "is  to  have  him  to 
breakfast  with  me,  and  interview  him  generally, 
and  get  him  to  read  me  a  few  passages,  without 
rousing  his  suspicions.  Heigh  1 " 

"  I  don't  know  that  I  believe  much  in  your  plan," 
said  Corey.  "  I  should  like  to  hear  what  my 
spiritual  adviser  has  to  say." 

"  I  shouldn't  know  what  to  advise,  exactly,"  said 
Sewell.  "But  I  won't  reject  any  plan  that  gives 
my  client  a  chance." 

"  Isn't  client  rather  euphuistic  1  "  asked  Corey. 

"  It  is,  rather.  But  I  've  got  into  the  habit  of 
handling  Barker  very  delicately,  even  in  thought. 
I  'm  not  sure  he  '11  come,"  added  Sewell,  turning  to 
Bellingham. 

"  Oh  yes,  he  will,"  said  Bellingham.  "  Tell  him 
ib  's  business.  There  won't  be  anybody  there.  Will 
nine  be  too  late  for  him  1  " 

"I  imagine  he's  more  accustomed  to  half-past 
five  at  home,  and  seven  here." 

"  Well,  we  '11  say  nine,  anyway.  I  can't  imagine 
the  cause  that  would  get  me  up  earlier.  Here  ! " 
He  turned  to  the  mantel  and  wrote  an  invitation 
upon  his  card,  and  handed  it  to  Sewell.  "  Please 
give  him  that  from  me,  and  beg  him  to  come.  I 
really  want  to  see  him,  and  if  he  can't  read  well 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     371 

enough  for  this  fastidious  old  gentleman,  we  '11  see 
what  else  he  can  do.  Corey  tells  me  he  expects 
Tom  on  this  summer,"  he  concluded,  in  dismissal 
of  Lemuel  as  a  topic. 

"Ah,"  said  Sewell,  putting  the  card  in  his  pocket, 
"  I  'm  very  glad  to  hear  that." 

He  had  something,  but  not  so  much,  of  the  diffi 
culty  in  overcoming  Lemuel's  reluctance  that  he  had 
feared,  and  on  the  morning  named  Lemuel  presented 
himself  at  the  address  on  Bellingham's  card  exactly 
at  nine.  He  had  the  card  in  his  hand,  and  he  gave 
it  to  the  man  who  opened  the  street  door  of  the 
bachelors'  apartment  house  where  Bellingham  lived. 
The  man  read  it  carefully  over,  and  then  said,  "  Oh 
yes  ;  second  floor,"  and,  handing  it  back,  left  Lemuel 
to  wander  upstairs  alone.  He  was  going  to  offer 
the  card  again  at  Bellingham's  door,  but  he  had  a 
dawning  misgiving.  Bellingham  had  opened  the 
door  himself,  and,  feigning  to  regard  the  card  as 
offered  by  way  of  introduction,  he  gave  his  hand 
cordially,  and  led  him  into  the  cozy  room,  where  the 
table  was  already  laid  for  breakfast. 

"Glad  to  see  you — glad  to  see  you,  Mr.  Barker. 
Give  me  your  coat.  Ah,  I  see  you  scorn  the  effemi 
nacy  of  half-season  things.  Put  your  hat  anywhere. 
The  advantage  of  bachelors'  quarters  is  that  you  can 
put  anything  anywhere.  We  haven't  a  woman  on 
the  premises,  and  you  can  fancy  how  unmolested 
we  are." 

Lemuel  had  caught  sight  of  one  over  the  mantel, 
who  had  nothing  but  her  Mrater-colours  on,  and  was 


372  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

called  an  "£tude;"  but  he  no  longer  trembled,  for 
evil  or  for  good,  in  such  presences.  "  That 's  one  of 
those  Romano-Spanish  things,"  said  Bellingham, 
catching  the  direction  of  his  eye.  "  I  forget  the 
fellow's  name  ;  but  it  isn't  bad.  We  're  pretty  snug 
here,"  he  added,  throwing  open  two  doors  in  suc 
cession,  to  show  the  extent  of  his  apartment. 
"  Here  you  have  the  dining-room  and  drawing-room 
and  library  in  one  ;  and  here 's  my  bedroom,  and 
here 's  my  bath." 

He  pulled  an  easy-chair  up  toward  the  low  fire 
for  Lemuel.  "  But  perhaps  you  're  hot  from 
walking  1  Sit  wherever  you  like." 

Lemuel  chose  to  sit  by  the  window.  "  It 's  very 
mild  out,"  he  said,  and  Bellingham  did  not  exact 
anything  more  of  him.  He  talked  at  him,  and 
left  Lemuel  to  make  his  mental  inventory  of  the 
dense  Turkey  rugs  on  the  slippery  hardwood  floor, 
the  pictures  on  the  walls,  the  deep,  leather-lined 
seats,  the  bric-a-brac  on  the  mantel,  the  tall,  coloured 
chests  of  drawers  in  two  corners,  the  delicate  china 
and  quaint  silver  on  the  table. 

Presently  steps  were  heard  outside,  and 
Bellingham  threw  open  the  door  as  he  had  to 
Lemuel,  and  gave  a  hand  to  each  of  the  two  guests 
whom  he  met  on  his  threshold. 

"  Ah,  Meredith !  Good  morning,  venerable 
father  !  "  He  drew  them  in.  "  Let  me  introduce 
you  to  Mr.  Barker,  Mr.  Meredith.  Mr.  Barker,  the 
Rev.  Mr.  Seyton.  You  fellows  are  pretty  prompt." 

"  We  're  pretty  hungry,"  said  Mr.  Meredith.     "I 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.    373 

don't  know  that  we  should  have  got  here  if  we 
hadn't  leaned  up  against  each  other  as  we  came 
along.  Several  policemen  regarded  us  suspiciously, 
but  Seyton's  cloth  protected  us." 

"It  was  terrible,  coming  up  Beacon  Street  with 
an  old  offender  like  Meredith,  at  what  he  considered 
the  dead  hour  of  the  night,"  said  Mr.  Seyton.  "  I 
don't  know  what  I  should  have  done  if  any  one  had 
been  awake  to  see  us." 

"You  shall  have  breakfast  instantly,"  said 
Bellingham,  touching  an  annunciator,  and  awakening 
a  distant  electric  titter  somewhere. 

Mr.  Seyton  came  toward  Lemuel,  who  took  the 
young  Ritualist  for  a  Catholic  priest,  but  was  not 
proof  against  the  sweet  friendliness  which  charmed 
every  one  with  him,  and  was  soon  talking  at  more 
ease  than  he  had  felt  from  all  Bellingham's  cordial 
intention.  He  was  put  at  his  host's  right  hand 
when  they  sat  down,  and  Mr.  Seyton  was  given  the 
foot,  so  that  they  continued  their  talk. 

"Mr.  Bellingham  tells  me  you  know  my  friend 
Sewell,"  said  the  clergyman. 

Lemuel's  face  kindled.  "  Oh  yes !  Do  you 
know  him  too  1 " 

"  Yes,  I  Ve  known  him  a  long  time.  He 's  a 
capital  fellow,  Sewell  is.;' 

"  I  think  he 's  a  great  preacher/'  ventured 
Lemuel. 

"  Ah — well — yes  ?  Is  he  1  I  've  never  heard  him 
lecture,"  said  Mr.  Seyton,  looking  down  at  his  bread. 

"I  swear,  Seyton,"  said  Meredith  across  the  table, 


374 


OR, 


"when  you  put  on  that  ecclesiastical  supercilious 
ness  of  yours,  I  want  to  cuff  you." 

"I've  .no  doubt  he'd  receive  it  in  a  proper 
spirit,"  said  Bellingham,  who  was  eating  himself  hot 
and  red  from  the  planked  shad  before  him.  "  But 
you  mustn't  do  it  here." 

"  Of  course,"  said  Mr.  Seyton,  "  Sewell  is  a  very 
able  man,  and  no  end  of  a  good  fellow,  but  you  can't 
expect  me  to  admit  he  's  a  priest." 

He  smiled  in  sweet  enjoyment  of  his  friend's 
wrath.  Lemuel  observed  that  he  spoke  with  an 
accent  different  from  the  others,  which  he  thought 
very  pleasant,  but  he  did  not  know  it  for  that  neat 
utterance  which  the  Anglican  Church  bestows  upon 
its  servants. 

"  He  's  no  Jesuit,"  growled  Meredith. 

"I'm  bound  to  say  he's  not  a  pagan,  either," 
laughed  the  clergyman. 

"  These  gentlemen,  exchange  these  little  knocks," 
Bellingham  explained  to  Lemuel's  somewhat  puzzled 
look,  "because  they' were  boys  together  at  school 
and  college,  and  can't  realise  that  they  've  grown  up 
to  be  lights  of  the  bar  and  the  pulpit."  He  looked 
round  at  the  different  plates.  "Have  some  more 
shad  1 "  No  one  wanted  more,  it  seemed,  and 
Bellingham  sent  it  away  by  the  man,  who  replaced  it 
with  broiled  chicken  before  Bellingham,  and  lamb 
chops  in  front  of  Mr.  Seyton.  "  This  is  all  there  is," 
the  host  said. 

"  It 's  enough  for  me,"  said  Meredith,  "  if  no  one 
else  takes  anything." 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     375 

But  in  fact  there  was  also  an  omelet,  and  bread 
and  butter  delicious  beyond  anything  that  Lemuel 
had  tasted  ;  and  there  was  a  bouquet  of  pink  radishes 
with  fragments  of  ice  dropped  among  olives,  and 
other  facts  of  a  polite  breakfast.  At  the  close  came 
a  dish  of  what  Bellingham  called  premature  straw 
berries. 

"  Why  !  they  're  actually  sweet !  "  said  Meredith, 
"and  they're  as  natural  as  emery-bags." 

"Yes,  they're  all  you  say,"  said  Bellingham. 
"You  can  have  strawberries  any  time  nowadays 
after  New  Year's,  if  you  send  far  enough  for  them ; 
but  to  get  them  ripe  and  sound,  or  distinguishable 
from  small  turnips  in  taste,  is  another  thing." 

Lemuel  had  never  imagined  a  breakfast  like  that ; 
he  wondered  at  himself  for  having  respected  the 
cuisine  of  the  St.  Albans.  It  seemed  to  him  that  he 
and  the  person  he  had  been — the  farm-boy,  the  cap 
tive  of  the  police,  the  guest  of  the  Wayfarer's  Lodge, 
the  servant  of  Miss  Vane,  and  the  head-waiter  at  the 
hotel— could  not  be  the  same  person.  He  fell  into 
a  strange  reverie,  while  the  talk,  in  which  he  had 
shared  so  little,  took  a  range  far  beyond  him. 
Then  he  looked  up  and  found  all  the  others'  eyes 
upon  him,  and  heard  Bellingham  saying,  "  I  fancy 
Mr.  Barker  can  tell  us  something  about  that,"  and 
at  Lemuel's  mystified  stare  he  added,  "About  the 
amount  of  smoke  at  a  fire  that  a  man  could  fight 
through.  Mr.  Seyton  was  speaking  of  the  train  that 
was  caught  in  the  forest  fires  down  in  Maine  the 
other  day.  How  was  it  with  you  at  the  St.  Albans? " 


376  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

Lemuel  blushed.  It  was  clear  that  Mr.  Bellingham 
had  been  reading  that  ridiculous  newspaper  version 
of  his  exploit.  "There  was  hardly  any  smoke  at 
all  where  I  was.  It  didn't  seem  to  have  got  into 
the  upper  entries  much." 

"That's  just  what  I  was  saying!"  triumphed 
Bellingham.  "  If  a  man  has  anything  to  do,  he  can 
get  on.  That 's  the  way  with  the  firemen.  It 's  the 
rat-in-a-trap  idea  that  paralyses.  Do  you  remember 
your  sensations  at  all,  when  you  were  coming 
through  the  fire  1  Those  things  are  very  curious 
sometimes,"  Bellingham  suggested. 

"There  was  no  fire  where  I  was,"  said  Lemuel 
stoutly,  but  helpless  to  make  a  more  comprehensive 
disclaimer. 

"I  imagine  you  wouldn't  notice  that,  any  more 
than  the  smoke,"  said  Bellingham,  with  a  look  of 
satisfaction  in  his  hero  for  his  other  guests.  "  It 's 
a  sort  of  ecstasy.  Do  you  remember  that  fellow  of 
Bret  Harte's,  in  How  Christmas  came  to  Simpson's 
Bar,  who  gets  a  shot  in  his  leg,  or  something,  when 
he  's  riding  to  get  the  sick  boy  a  Christmas  present, 
and  doesn't  know  it  till  he  drops  off  his  horse  in  a 
faint  when  he  gets  back  1 "  He  jumped  actively  up 
from  the  table,  and  found  the  book  on  his  shelf. 
"  There  ! "  He  fumbled  for  his  glasses  without 
finding  them.  "  Will  you  be  kind  enough  to  read  the 
passage,  Mr.  Barker  ?  I  think  I  've  found  the  page. 
It's  marked."  He  sat  down  again,  and  the  others 
waited. 

Lemuel  read,  as  he  needs  must,  and  he  did  his  best. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     377 

"  Ah,  that 's  very  nice.  Glad  you  didn't  dramatise 
it ;  the  drama  ought  to  be  in  the  words,  not  the 
reader.  I  like  your  quiet  way." 

"  Harte  seems  to  have  been  about  the  last  of  the 
story-tellers  to  give  us  the  great,  simple  heroes," 
said  Seyton. 

When  the  others  were  gone,  and  Lemuel,  who 
had  been  afraid  tp  go  first,  rose  to  take  himself 
away,  Bellingham  shook  his  hand  cordially  and 
said,  "I  hope  you  weren't , bored  1  The  fact  is, 
I  rather  promised  myself  a  tete-h-tete  with  you, 
and  I  told  Mr.  Sewell  so ;  but  I  fell  in  with 
Seyton  and  Meredith  yesterday — you  can't  help 
falling  in  with  one  when  you  fall  in  with  the 
other ;  they  're  inseparable  when  Sey ton's  in  town- 
and  I  couldn't  resist  the  temptation  to  ask  them." 

"  Oh  no,  I  wasn't  bored  at  all,"  said  Lemuel. 

"  I  'm  very  glad.  But — sit  down  a  moment.  I 
want  to  speak  to  you  about  a  little  matter  of 
business.  Mr.  Sewell  was  telling  us  something  of 
you  the  other  night,  at  my  cousin  Bromfield  Corey's, 
and  it  occurred  to  me  that  you  might  be  willing  to 
come  and  read  to  him.  His  eyes  seem  to  be  on  the 
wane,  some  way,  and  he 's  rather  sleepless.  He  'd 
give  you  a  bed,  and  sometimes  you  'd  have  to  read 
to  him  in  the  night ;  you  'd  take  your  meals  where 
you  like.  How  does  it  strike  you,  supposing  the 
'  harnsome  pittance '  can  be  arranged  ?  " 

"  Why,  if  you  think  I  can  do  it,"  began  Lemuel. 

"  Of  course  I  do.  You  don't  happen  to  read 
French  1 " 


378  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE. 

Lemuel  shook  his  head  hopelessly.  "I  studied 
Latin  some  at  school " 

"  Ah  !  Well !  I  don't  think  he  'd  care  for  Latin. 
I  think  we  'd  better  stick  to  English  for  the  present." 

Bellingham  arranged  for  Lemuel  to  go  with  him 
that  afternoon  to  his  cousin's  and  make,  as  he 
phrased  it,  a  stagger  at  the  job. 


XXVI. 

THE  stagger  seemed  to  be  sufficiently  satisfactory. 
Corey  could  not  repress  some  twinges  at  certain 
characteristics  of  Lemuel's  accent,  but  he  seemed,  in 
a  critical  way,  to  take  a  fancy  to  him,  and  he  was 
conditionally  installed  for  a  week. 

Corey  was  pleased  from  the  beginning  with 
Lemuel's  good  looks,  and  justified  himself  to  his 
wife  with  an  Italian  proverb  :  "  Novanta  su  cento,  chi 
I  hello  difuori  e  buono  di  dentro"  She  had  heard  that 
proverb  before,  and  she  had  always  considered  it 
shocking ;  but  he  insisted  that  most  people  married 
upon  no  better  grounds,  and  that  what  sufficed  in 
the  choice  of  a  husband  or  wife  was  enough  for  the 
choice  of  an  intellectual  nurse.  He  corrected 
Lemuel's  pronunciation  where  he  found  it  faulty, 
and  amused  himself  with  Lemuel's  struggles  to  con 
ceal  his  hurt  vanity,  and  his  final  good  sense  in 
profiting  by  the  correction.  But  Lemuel's  reading 
was  really  very  good ;  it  was  what,  even  more  than 
his  writing,  had  given  him  a  literary  reputation  in 
Willoughby  Pastures ;  and  the  old  man  made  him 
exercise  it  in  widely  different  directions.  Chiefly, 
however,  it  was  novels  that  he  read,  which,  indeed, 


380  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

are  the  chief  reading  of  most  people  in  our  time ; 
and  as  they  were  necessarily  the  novels  of  our 
language,  his  elder  was  not  obliged  to  use  that  care 
in  choosing  them  which  he  must  have  exacted  of 
himself  in  the  fiction  of  other  tongues.  He  liked 
to  hear  Lemuel  talk,  and  he  used  the  art  of  getting 
at  the  boy's  life  by  being  frank  with  his  own  expe 
rience.  But  this  was  not  always  successful,  and  he 
was  interested  to  find  Lemuel  keeping  doors  that 
Sewell's  narrative  had  opened  carefully  closed  against 
him.  He  betrayed  no  consciousness  that  they  existed, 
and  Lemuel  maintained  intact  the  dignity  and 
pride  which  come  from  the  sense  of  ignominy  well 
hidden. 

The  week  of  probation  had  passed  without  inter 
rupting  their  relation,  and  Lemuel  was  regularly 
installed,  and  began  to  lead  a  life  which  was  so  cut 
off  from  his  past  in  most  things  that  it  seemed  to 
belie  it.  He  found  himself  dropped  in  the  midst  of 
luxury  stranger  to  him  than  the  things  they  read  of 
in  those  innumerable  novels.  The  dull,  rich  colours 
in  the  walls,  and  the  heavily  rugged  floors  and  dark- 
wooded  leathern  seats  of  the  library  where  he  read 
to  the  old  man  ;  the  beautiful  forms  of  the  famous 
bronzes,  and  the  Italian  saints  and  martyrs  in  their 
baroque  or  Gothic  frames  of  dim  gold  ;  the  low  shelves 
with  their  ranks  of  luxurious  bindings,  and  all  the 
seriously  elegant  keeping  of  the  place,  flattered  him 
out  of  his  strangeness  ;  and  the  footing  on  which  he 
was  received  in  this  house,  the  low-voiced  respect 
with  which  the  man-servant  treated  him,  the  master's 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  381 

light,  cordial  frankness,  the  distant  graciousness  of 
the  mistress,  and  the  unembarrassed,  unembarrassing 
kindliness  of  the  young  ladies,  both  so  much  older 
than  himself,  contributed  to  an  effect  that  afterwards 
deepened  more  and  more,  and  became  a  vital  part  of 
the  struggle  which  he  was  finally  to  hold  with  himself. 

The  first  two  or  three  days  he  saw  no  one  but 
Mr.  Corey,  and  but  for  the  women's  voices  in  the 
other  parts  of  the  house,  he  might  have  supposed 
himself  in  another  bachelor's  apartments,  finer  and 
grander  than  Bellingham's.  He  was  presented  to 
Mrs.  Corey  when  she  came  into  the  library,  but  he 
did  not  see  the  daughters  of  the  house  till  he  was 
installed  in  it.  After  that,  his  acquaintance  with 
them  seemed  to  go  no  further.  They  were  all  polite 
and  kind  when  they  met  him,  in  the  library  or  on 
the  stairs,  but  they  showed  no  curiosity  about  him  ; 
and  his  never  meeting  them  at  table  helped  to  keep 
him  a  stranger  to  them  under  the  same  roof.  He 
ate  at  a  boarding-house  in  a  neighbouring  street,  but 
he  slept  at  the  Coreys'  after  he  had  read  their  father 
asleep,  and  then,  going  out  to  his  late  breakfast,  he 
did  not  return  till  Mr.  Corey  had  eaten  his  own, 
much  later. 

He  wondered  at  first  that  neither  of  those  young 
ladies  read  to  their  father,  not  knowing  the  disability 
for  mutual  help  that  riches  bring.  Later,  he  saw 
how  much  Miss  Lily  Corey  was  engrossed  with 
charity  and  art,  and  how  constantly  Miss  Nannie 
Corey  was  occupied  with  social  cares,  and  was  per 
petually  going  and  coming  in  their  performance. 


382  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

Then  he  saw  that  they  could  not  have  rendered  nor 
their  father  have  received  from  his  family  the  duty 
which  he  was  paid  to  do,  as  they  must  have  done  if 
they  had  been  poorer.  But  they  were  all  fond  of 
one  another,  and  the  father  had  a  way  of  joking  with 
his  daughters,  especially  the  youngest ;  and  they 
talked  with  a  freedom  of  themselves  which  puzzled 
Lemuel.  It  appeared  from  what  they  said  at 
different  times  that  they  had  not  always  been  so 
vich,  or  that  they  had  once  had  money,  and  then 
less,  and  now  much  more.  It  appeared  also  that 
their  prosperity  was  due  to  a  piece  of  luck,  and  that 
the  young  Mr.  Corey,  whom  they  expected  in  the 
summer,  had  brought  it  about.  His  father  was  very 
proud  of  him,  and,  getting  more  and  more  used  to 
Lemuel's  companionship,  he  talked  a  great  deal 
about  his  Tom,  as  he  called  him,  and  about  Tom's 
wife,  and  his  wife's  family,  who  were  somehow, 
Lemuel  inferred,  not  all  that  his  own  family  could 
wish  them,  but  very  good  people.  Once  when  Mr. 
Corey  was  talking  of  them,  Mrs.  Corey  came  in  upon 
them,  and  seemed  to  be  uneasy,  as  if  she  thought  he 
was  saying  too  much.  But  the  daughters  did  not 
seem  to  care,  especially  the  youngest. 

He  found  out  that  Mr.  Corey  used  to  be  a  painter, 
and  had  lived  a  long  time  in  Italy  when  he  was 
young,  and  he  recalled  with  a  voluptuous  thrill  of 
secrecy  that  Williams  had  once  been  in  Italy.  Mr. 
Corey  seemed  to  think  better  of  it  than  Williams ; 
he  liked  to  talk  of  Rome  and  Florence,  and  of  Venice, 
which  Williams  had  said  was  a  kind  of  hole.  The 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  383 

old  man  said  this  or  that  picture  was  of  this  or  that 
school,  and  vague  lights  of  knowledge  and  senses  of 
difference  that  nattered  Lemuel's  intellectual  vanity 
stole  in  upon  him.  He  began  to  feel  that  the  things 
Mr.  Corey  had  lived  for  were  the  great  and  high 
objects  of  life. 

He  now  perceived  how  far  from  really  fine  or 
fashionable  anything  at  the  St.  Albans  had  been,  and 
that  the  simplicity  of  Miss  Vane's  little  house,  which 
the  splendour  of  the  hotel  had  eclipsed  in  his  crude 
fancy,  was  much  more  in  harmony  with  the  richness 
of  Mr.  Corey's.  He  oriented  himself  anew,  and  got 
another  view  of  the  world  which  he  had  dropped 
into.  Occasionally  he  had  glimpses  of  people  who 
came  to  see  the  Corey s,  and  it  puzzled  him  that  this 
family,  which  he  knew  so  kind  and  good,  took  with 
others  the  tone  hard  and  even  cynical  which  seemed 
the  prevailing  tone  of  society  ;  when  their  acquaint 
ances  went  away  they  dropped  back,  as  if  with  relief, 
into  their  sincere  and  amiable  fashions  of  speech. 
Lemuel  asked  himself  if  every  one  in  the  world  was 
playing  a  part ;  it  did  not  seem  to  him  that  Miss 
Carver  had  been ;  she  was  always  the  same,  and 
always  herself.  To  be  one's-self  appeared  to  him 
the  best  thing  in  the  world,  and  he  longed  for  it  the 
more  as  he  felt  that  he  too  was  insensibly  beginning 
to  play  a  part.  Being  so  much  in  this  beautiful  and 
luxurious  house,  where  every  one  was  so  well  dressed 
and  well  mannered,  and  well  kept  in  body  and  mind, 
and  passing  from  his  amazement  at  all  its  appoint 
ments  into  the  habit  of  its  comfortable  beauty,  he 


384  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

forgot  more  and  more  the  humility  and  the  humilia 
tions  of  his  past.  He  did  not  forget  its  claims  upon 
him ;  he  sent  home  every  week  the  greater  part  of 
his  earnings,  and  he  wrote  often  to  his  mother ;  but 
now,  when  he  could  have  got  the  time  to  go 
home  and  see  her,  he  did  not  go.  In  the  exquisite 
taste  of  his  present  environment,  he  could  scarcely 
believe  in  that  figure,  grizzled,  leathern,  and  gaunt, 
and  costumed  in  a  grotesque  unlikeness  to  either  sex. 
Sometimes  he  played  with  the  fantastic  supposition 
of  some  other  origin  for  himself,  romantic  and 
involved  like  that  of  some  of  the  heroes  he  was 
always  reading  of,  which  excluded  her. 

Another  effect  of  this  multifarious  literature 
through  which  his  duties  led  him  was  the  awakening 
of  the  ambition  to  write,  stunned  by  his  first  disas 
trous  adventures  in  Boston,  and  dormant  almost  ever 
since,  except  as  it  had  stirred  under  the  promptings 
of  Evans's  kindly  interest.  But  now  it  did  not  take 
the  form  of  verse ;  he  began  to  write  moralistic 
essays,  never  finished,  but  full  of  severe  comment  on 
the  folly  of  the  world  as  he  saw  it.  Sometimes  they 
were  examinations  of  himself,  and  his  ideas  and 
principles,  his  doctrines  and  practice,  penetrating 
quests  such  as  the  theologians  of  an  earlier  day  used 
to  address  to  their  consciences. 

Meantime,  the  deeply  underlying  mass  of  his 
rustic  crudity  and  raw  youth  took  on  a  far  higher 
polish  than  it  had  yet  worn.  Words  dropped  at 
random  in  the  talk  he  now  heard  supplied  him  with 
motives  and  shaped  his  actions.  Once  Mr.  Belling- 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  385 

ham  came  in  laughing  about  a  sign  which  he  saw  in 
a  back  street,  of  Misfit  Parlours,  and  Lemuel  spent 
the  next  week's  salary  for  a  suit  at  a  large  clothing 
store,  to  replace  the  dress  Sewell  had  thought  him 
so  well  in.  He  began  insensibly  to  ape  the  manners 
of  those  about  him. 

It  drew  near  the  time  when  the  ladies  of  the 
Corey  family  were  to  leave  town,  where  they  had 
lingered  much  longer  than  they  meant,  in  the  hope 
that  Mr.  Corey  might  be  so  much  better,  or  so  much 
worse,  that  he  would  consent  to  go  to  the  shore  with 
them.  But  his  disabilities  remained  much  the  same, 
and  his  inveterate  habits  indomitable.  By  this  time 
that  trust  in  Lemuel,  which  never  failed  to  grow  up 
in  those  near  him,  reconciled  the  ladies  to  the 
obstinate  resolution  of  the  master  of  the  house  to 
stay  in  it  as  usual.  They  gave  up  the  notion  of  a 
cottage,  and  they  were  not  going  far  away,  nor  for 
long  at  any  one  time ;  in  fact,  one  or  other  of  them 
was  always  in  the  house.  Mrs.  Corey  had  grown 
into  the  habit  of  confidence  with  Lemuel  concerning 
her  husband's  whims  and  foibles ;  and  this  motherly 
frankness  from  a  lady  so  stately  and  distant  at  first 
was  a  flattery  more  poisonous  to  his  soul  than  any 
other  circumstance  of  his  changed  life. 

It  came  July,  and  even  Sewell  went  away  then. 
He  went  with  a  mind  at  rest  concerning  Lemuel's 
material  prospects,  and  his  unquestionable  usefulness 
and  acceptability ;  but  something,  at  the  bottom  of 
his  satisfaction,  teased  him  still :  a  dumb  fear  that 
the  boy  was  extravagant,  a  sense  that  he  was  some- 

2B 


386  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  j   OR, 

how  different,  and  not  wholly  for  the  better,  from 
what  he  had  been.  He  had  seen,  perhaps,  nothing 
worse  in  him  than  that  growth  of  manner  which 
amused  Corey. 

"He  is  putting  us  on,"  he  said  to  Bellingham  one 
day,  "  and  making  us  fit  as  well  as  he  can.  I  don't 
think  we  're  altogether  becoming,  but  that 's  our 
fault,  probably.  I  can't  help  thinking  that  if  we 
were  of  better  cut  and  material  we  should  show  to 
better  effect  upon  that  granite  soul.  I  wish  Tom 
were  here.  I  've  an  idea  that  Tom  would  fit  him 
like  a  glove.  Charles,  why  don't  you  pose  as  a  model 
for  Barker?" 

"  I  don't  see  why  I  'm  not  a  very  good  model 
without  posing,"  said  Bellingham.  "  What  do  you 
want  me  to  do  for  him  1  Take  him  to  the  club  1 
Barker's  not  very  conversational." 

"  You  don't  take  him  on  the  right  topics,"  said 
Corey,  not  minding  that  he  had  left  the  point.  "  I 
assure  you  that  Barker,  on  any  serious  question  that 
comes  up  in  our  reading,  has  a  clear  head  and  an 
apt  tongue  of  his  own.  It  isn't  our  manners  alone 
that  he  emulates.  I  can't  find  that  any  of  us  ever 
dropped  an  idea  or  suggestion  of  value  that  Barker 
didn't  pick  it  up,  and  turn  it  to  much  more  account 
than  the  owner.  He 's  as  true  as  a  Tuscan  peasant, 
as  proud  as  an  Indian,  and  as  quick  as  a  Yankee." 

"Ah!  I  hoped  you  wouldn't  go  abroad  for  that 
last,"  said  Bellingham. 

"  No ;  and  it 's  delightful,  seeing  the  great  variety 
of  human  nature  there  is  in  every  human  being  here. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     387 

Our  life  isn't  stratified  ;  perhaps  it  never  will  be.  At 
any  rate,  for  the  present,  we  're  all  in  vertical  sections. 
But  I  always  go  back  to  my  first  notion  of  Barker  : 
he 's  ancestral,  and  he  makes  me  feel  like  degenerate 
posterity.  I've  had  the  same  sensation  with  Tom ;  but 
Barker  seems  to  go  a  little  further  back.  I  suppose 
there 's  such  a  thing  as  getting  too  far  back  in  these 
Origin  of  Species  days  ;  but  he  isn't  excessive  in  that 
or  in  anything.  He 's  confoundedly  temperate,  in  fact ; 
and  he 's  reticent ;  he  doesn't  allow  any  unseemly  in 
timacy.  He's  always  turning  me  out-of-doors." 

"  Of  course  !  But  what  can  we  old  fellows  hope 
to  know  of  what 's  going  on  in  any  young  one  1 
Talk  of  strangeness  !  I  'd  undertake  to  find  more  in 
common  with  a  florid  old  fellow  of  fifty  from  the  red 
planet  Mars  than  with  any  young  Bostonian  of 
twenty." 

"  Yes  •  but  it 's  the  youth  of  my  sires  that  I  find 
so  strange  in  Barker.  Only,  theoretically,  there's 
no  Puritanism.  He  's  a  thorough  believer  in  Sewell. 
I  suspect  he  could  formulate  Se well's  theology  a 
great  deal  better  than  Sewell  could." 


XXVII 

STATIRA  and  'Manda  Grier  had  given  up  their 
plan  of  getting  places  in  a  summer  hotel  when 
Lemuel  absolutely  refused  to  take  part  in  it,  and 
were  working  through  the  summer  in  the  box-factory. 
Lemuel  came  less  regularly  to  see  them  now,  for  his 
Sunday  nights  had  to  be  at  Mr.  Corey's  disposition ; 
but  Statira  was  always  happy  in  his  coming,  and 
made  him  more  excuses  than  he  had  thought  of,  if 
he  had  let  a  longer  interval  than  usual  pass.  He 
could  not  help  feeling  the  loveliness  of  her  patience, 
the  sweetness  of  her  constancy ;  but  he  disliked 
'Manda  Grier  more  and  more,  and  she  grew  stiffer 
and  sharper  with  him.  Sometimes  the  aimlessness 
of  his  relation  to  Statira  hang  round  him  like  a 
cloud,  which  he  could  not  see  beyond.  When  he 
was  with  her  he  contented  himself  with  the  pleasure 
he  felt  in  her  devotion,  and  the  tenderness  this 
awakened  in  his  own  heart ;  but  when  he  was  away 
from  her  there  was  a  strange  disgust  and  bitterness 
in  these. 

Sometimes,  when  Statira  and  'Manda  Grier  took  a 
Saturday  afternoon  off,  he  went  with  them  into  the 

388 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     389 

country  on  one  of  the  horse-car  lines,  or  else  to  some 
matinee  at  a  garden-theatre  in  the  suburbs.  Statira 
liked  the  theatre  better  than  anything  else  ;  and 
she  used  to  meet  other  girls  whom  she  knew  there, 
and  had  a  gay  time.  She  introduced  Lemuel  to 
them,  and  after  a  few  moments  of  high  civility  and 
distance  they  treated  him  familiarly,  as  Statira's 
beau.  Their  talk,  after  that  he  was  now  used  to, 
was  flat  and  foolish,  and  their  pert  ease  incensed 
him.  He  came  away  bruised  and  burning,  and 
feeling  himself  unfit  to  breathe  the  refined  and 
gentle  air  to  which  he  returned  in  Mr.  Corey's 
presence.  Then  he  would  vow  in  his  heart  never  to 
expose  himself  to  such  things  again ;  but  he  could 
not  tell  Statira  that  he  despised  the  friends  she  was 
happy  with ;  he  could  only  go  with  a  reluctance  it 
was  not  easy  to  hide,  and  atone  by  greater  tenderness 
for  a  manner  that  wounded  her.  One  day  toward 
the  end  of  August,  when  they  were  together  at  a 
suburban  theatre,  Statira  wandered  off  to  a  pond 
there  was  in  the  grounds  with  some  other  girls,  who 
had  asked  him  to  go  and  row  them,  and  had  called 
him  a  bear  for  refusing,  and  told  him  to  look  out  for 
Barnum.  They  left  him  sitting  alone  with  'Manda 
Grier,  at  a  table  where  they  had  all  been  having  ice 
cream  at  his  expense ;  and  though  it  was  no  longer 
any  pleasure  to  be  with  her,  it  was  better  than  to  be 
with  them,  for  she  was  not  a  fool,  at  any  rate. 
Statira  turned  round  at  a  little  distance  to  mock 
them  with  a  gesture  and  a  laugh,  and  the  laugh 
ended  in  a  cough,  long  and  shattering,  so  that  one 


390  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

of  her  companions  had  to  stop  with  her,  and  put 
her  arm  round  her  till  she  could  recover  herself 
and  go  on. 

It  sent  a  cold  thrill  through  Lemuel,  and  then  he 
turned  angry.  "  What  is  it  Statira  does  to  keep 
taking  more  cold  ?" 

"  Oh,  I  guess  'tain't  'ny  more  cold,"  said  'Manda 
Grier. 

"What  do  you  mean  1" 

"  I  guess 'f  you  cared  a  great  deal  you'd  noticed 
that  cough  'f  hers  before  now.  'Tain't  done  it  any 
too  much  good  workin'  in  that  arsenic  paper  all 
summer  long." 

'Manda  Grier  talked  with  her  face  turned  away 
from  him. 

It  provoked  him  more  and  more.  "  I  do  care," 
he  retorted,  eager  to  quarrel,  "and  you  know  it. 
Who  got  her  into  the  box-*factory,  I  should  like 
to  know?" 

"/did!"  said  'Manda  Grier,  turning  sharply  on 
him,  "  and  you  kept  her  there ;  and  between  us 
we've  killed  her." 

"How  have  I  kept  her  there,  I  should  like  to 
know  ? " 

"  'F  you  'd  done  's  she  wanted  you  should,  she 
might  'a'  been  at  some  pleasant  place  in  the  country 
— the  mount'ns,  or  somewhere 't  she  'd  been  ov'r  her 
cough  by  this  time.  But  no  !  You  was  too  nasty 
proud  for  that,  Lemuel  Barker  !" 

A  heavy  load  of  guilt  dropped  upon  Lemuel's 
heart,  but  he  flung  it  off,  and  he  retorted  furiously, 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     391 

"  You  ought  to  have  been  ashamed  of  yourself  to 
ever  want  her  to  take  a  servant's  place." 

"  Oh,  a  servant's  place  !  If  she  'd  been  ashamed 
of  a  servant  when  you  came  meechin'  round  her, 
where 'd  you  been,  I  sh'd  like  to  know?  And  now 
I  wish  she  had  ;  '11'  if  she  wa'n't  such  a  little  fool,  V 
all  wrapped  in  you,  the  way  't  she  is,  I  could  wish  't 
she  'd  never  set  eyes  on  you  again,  servant  or  no 
servant.  But  I  presume  it 's  too  late  now,  and  I 
presume  she's  got  to  go  on  suff'rin'  for  you  and 
wonderin'  what  she 's  done  to  offend  you  when 
you  don't  come,  and  what  she  's  done  when  you 
do,  with  your  stuck-up,  masterful  airs,  and  your 
double-faced  ways.  But  don't  you  try  to  pretend 
to  me,  Lemuel  Barker,  't  you  care  the  least  mite 
for  her  any  more,  'f  you  ever  did,  because  it  won't 
go  down  !  'N'  if  S'tira  wa'n't  such  a  perfect  little 
blind  fool,  she  could  see  't  you  didn't  care  for  her 
any  more  than  the  ground  't  you  walk  on,  'n' 
7t  you  'd  be  glad  enough  if  she  was  under  it,  if 
you  couldn't  be  rid  of  her  any  other  way ! " 
;Manda  Grier  pulled  her  handkerchief  out  and 
began  to  cry  into  it. 

Lemuel  was  powerfully  shaken  by  this  attack ;  he 
did  feel  responsible  for  Statira's  staying  in  town  all 
summer ;  but  the  spectacle  of  'Manda  Grier  publicly 
crying  at  his  side  in  a  place  like  that  helped  to 
counteract  the  effect  of  her  words.  "  'Sh  !  Don't 
cry ! "  he  began,  looking  fearfully  round  him. 
"  Everybody  '11  see  you!" 

"  I  don't  care  !     Let  them  !  "  sobbed  the  girl.     "  If 


392  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

they  knowed  what  I  know,  and  could  see  you  not 
cryin',  I  guess  they  'd  think  you  looked  worse  than  I 
do!" 

"  You  don't  understand — I  can  explain " 

"  No,  you  can't  explain,  Mr.  Barker ! "  said 
'Manda  Grier,  whipping  down  her  handkerchief,  and 
fiercely  confronting  him  across  the  table.  "You 
can't  explain  anything  so  's  to  blind  me  any  longer  ! 
I  was  a  big  fool  to  ever  suppose  you  had  any  heart 
in  you ;  but  when  you  came  round  at  first,  and  was 
so  meek  you  couldn't  say  your  soul  was  your  own,  and 
was  so  glad  if  S'tira  spoke  to  you,  or  looked  at  you, 
that  you  was  ready  to  go  crazy,  I  did  suppose  there 
was  some  little  something  to  you  !  And  yes,  I  helped 
you  on  all  I  could,  and  helped  you  to  fool  that  poor 
thing  that  you  ain't  worthy  to  kiss  the  ground  she 
walks  on,  Lord  forgive  me  for  it !  But  it 's  all 
changed  now  !  You  seem  to  think  it 's  the  greatest 
favour  if  you  come  round  once  a  fortnight,  and  set 
and  let  her  talk  to  you,  and  show  you  how  she  dotes 
upon  you,  the  poor  little  silly  coot !  And  if  you  ever 
speak  a  word,  it 's  like  the  Lord  unto  Moses,  it 's  so 
grand  !  But  I  understand  !  You  Ve  got  other 
friends  now  !  You  after  that  art-student  ?  Oh,  you 
can  blush  and  try  to  turn  it  off !  I  Ve  seen  you  blush 
before,  and  I  know  you  !  And  I  know  you  're  in 
love  with  that  girl,  and  you  're  just  waitin'  to  break 
off  with  S'tira ;  but  you  hain't  got  the  spirit  to  up 
and  do  it  like  a  man  !  You  want  to  let  it  lag  along, 
and  lag  along,  and  see  'f  something  won't  happen  to 
get  you  out  of  it  !  You  waitin'  for  her  to  die  ?  Well, 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     393 

you  won't  have  to  wait  long  !  But  if  I  was  a  man, 
I  'd  spoil  your  beauty  for  you  first  ' 

The  torrent  of  her  words  rolled  him  on,  bruising 
and  tearing  his  soul,  which  their  truth  pierced  like 
jagged  points.  From  time  to  time  he  opened  his 
lips  to  protest  or  deny,  but  no  words  came,  and  in 
his  silence  a  fury  of  scorn  for  the  poor,  faithful, 
scolding  thing,  so  just,  so  wildly  unjust,  gathered 
head  in  him. 

"Be  still!"  he  ground  between  his  teeth.  "Be 

still,  you "  He  stopped  for  the  word,  and 

that  saved  him  from  the  outrage  he  had  meant  to 
pay  her  back  with.  He  rose  from  the  table.  "  You 
can  tell  Statira  what  you  'Ve  said  to  me.  I  'm  going 
home." 

He  rushed  away ;  the  anger  was  like  strong  drink 
in  his  brain  j  he  was  like  one  drunk  all  the  way 
back  to  the  city  in  the  car. 

He  could  not  go  to  Mr.  Corey's  at  once  ;  he  felt  as 
if  physically  besmeared  with  shame  •  he  could  not  go 
to  his  boarding-house ;  it  would  have  been  as  if  he 
had  shown  himself  there  in  a  coat  of  tar  and  feathers. 
Those  insolent,  true,  degrading  words  hissed  in  his 
ears,  and  stung  him  incessantly.  They  accused, 
they  condemned  with  pitiless  iteration;  and  yet 
there  were  instants  when  he  knew  himself  guiltless 
of  all  the  wrong  of  which  in  another  sense  he  knew 
himself  guilty.  In  his  room  he  renewed  the  battle 
within  himself  that  he  had  fought  so  long  in  his 
wanderings  up  and  down  the  street,  and  he  conquered 
himself  at  last  into  the  theory  that  Statira  had 


394  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE. 

authorised  or  permitted  'Manda  Grier  to  talk  to  him 
in  that  way.  This  simplified  the  whole  affair ;  it 
offered  him  the  release  which  he  now  knew  he  had 
longed  for.  As  he  stretched  himself  in  the  sheets  at 
daybreak,  he  told  himself  that  he  need  never  see 
either  of  them  again.  He  was  free. 


XXVIII. 

LEMUEL  went  through  the  next  day  in  that  licence 
of  revolt  which  every  human  soul  has  experienced 
in  some  measure  at  some  time.  We  look  back  at  it 
afterwards,  and  see  it  a  hideous  bondage.  But  for 
the  moment  Lemuel  rejoiced  in  it  j  and  he  abandoned 
himself  boldly  to  thoughts  that  had  hitherto  been  a 
furtive  and  trembling  rapture. 

In  the  afternoon,  when  he  was  most  at  leisure,  he 
walked  down  to  the  Public  Garden,  and  found  a 
seat  on  a  bench  near  the  fountain  where  the  Venus 
had  shocked  his  inexperience  the  first  time  he  saw 
her ;  he  remembered  that  simple  boy  with  a  smile  of 
pity,  and  then  went  back  into  n*is  cloud  of  reverie. 
There,  safely  hid  from  trouble  and  wrong,  he  told 
his  ideal  how  dear  she  was  to  him,  and  how  she  had 
shaped  and  governed  his  life,  and  made  it  better  and 
nobler  from  the  first  moment  they  had  met.  The 
fumes  of  the  romances  which  he  had  read  mixed 
with  the  love-born  delirium  in  his  brain  ;  he  was  no 
longer  low,  but  a  hero  of  lofty  line,  kept  from  his 
rightful  place  by  machinations  that  had  failed  at  last, 
and  now  he  was  leading  her,  his  bride,  into  the 

395 


396  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

ancient  halls  which  were  to  be  their 'home,  and  the 
source  of  beneficence  and  hope  to  all  the  poor  and 
humbly-born  around  them.  His  eyes  were  so  full  of 
this  fantastic  vision,  the  soul  of  his  youth  dwelt  so 
deeply  within  this  dream-built  tabernacle,  that  it  was 
with  a  shock  of  anguish  he  saw  coming  up  the  walk 
towards  him  the  young  girl  herself.  His  airy 
structure  fell  in  ruins  around  him;  he  was  again 
common  and  immeasurably  beneath  her;  she  was 
again  in  her  own  world,  where,  if  she  thought  of 
him  at  all,  it  must  be  as  a  squalid  vagabond  and  the 
accomplice  of  a  thief.  If  he  could  have  escaped,  he 
would,  but  he  could  not  move ;  he  sat  still  and 
waited  with  fallen' eyes  for  her  to  pass  him. 

At  sight  of  him  she  hesitated  and  wavered ;  then 
she  came  towards  him,  and  at  a  second  impulse  held 
out  her  hand,  smiling  with  a  radiant  pleasure. 

"  I  didn't  know  it  was  you  at  first,"  she  said. 
"  It  seems  so  strange  to  see  any  one  that  I  know  ! " 

"  I  didn't  expect  to  see  you,  either,"  he  stammered 
out,  getting  somehow  upon  his  feet,  and  taking  her 
hand,  while  his  fac?  burned,  and  he  could  not  keep 
his  eyes  on  hers;  "I — didn't  know  you  were 
here." 

"  I  've  only  been  here  a  few  days.  I  'm  drawing 
at  the  Museum.  I've  just  got  back.  Have  you 
been  here  all  summer  ? " 

"  Yes — all  summer.  I  hope  you  've  been  well — I 
suppose  you  've  been  away — 

"  Yes,  I  've  just  got  back,"  she  repeated. 

"  Oh  yes  !     I  meant  that  !  " 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     397 

She  smiled  at  his  confusion,  as  kindly  as  the  ideal 
of  his  day-dream.  "  I  Ve  been  spending  the  summer 
with  Madeline,  and  I  Ve  spent  most  of  it  out-of-doors, 
sketching.  Have  you  been  well  1 " 

"  Yes — not  very ;  oh  yes,  I  'm  well "  She 

had  begun  to  move  forward  with  the  last  question, 
and  he  found  himself  walking  with  her.  "  Did  she 
— has  Miss  Swan  come  back  with  you  1"  he  asked, 
looking  her  in  the  eyes  with  more  question  than  he 
had  put  into  his  words. 

"  No,  I  don't  think  she  '11  come  back  this  winter," 
said  the  girl.  "  You  know,"  she  went  on,  colouring 
a  little,  "that  she  's  married  now  1 " 

"No,"  said  Lemuel. 

"  Yes.  To  Mr.  Berry.  And  I  have  a  letter  from 
him  for  you." 

"  Was  he  there  with  you,  this  summer  ? "  asked 
Lemuel,  ignoring  alike  Berry's  marriage  and  the 
letter  from  him. 

"  Oh  yes  ;  of  course  !  And  I  liked  him  better 
than  I  used  to.  He  is  very  good,  and  if  Madeline 
didn't  have  to  go  so  far  West  to  live  !  He  will 
know  how  to  appreciate  her,  and  there  are  not 
many  who  can  do  that !  Her  father  thinks  he  has 
a  great  deal  of  ability.  Yes,  if  Madeline  had  to 
get  married  ! " 

She  talked  as  if  convincing  and  consoling  herself, 
and  there  was  an  accent  of  loneliness  in  it  all  that 
pierced  Lemuel's  preoccupation ;  he  had  hardly  noted 
how  almost  pathetically  glad  she  was  to  see  him. 
"You'll  miss  her  here,"  he  ventured. 


398  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  j   OR, 

"Oh,  I  don't  dare  to  think  of  it,"  cried  the  girl. 
"  I  don't  know  what  I  shall  do  !  When  I  first  saw 
you,  just  now,  it  brought  up  Madeline  and  last 
winter  so  that  it  seemed  too  much  to  bear !  " 

They  had  walked  out  of  the  garden  across  Charles 
Street,  and  were  climbing  the  slope  of  Beacon  Street 
Mall,  in  the  Common.  "I  suppose,"  she  continued, 
"the  only  way  will  be  to  work  harder,  and  try  to 
forget  it.  They  wanted  me  to  go  out  and  stay  with 
them ;  but  of  course  I  couldn't.  I  shall  work,  and 
I  shall  read.  I  shall  not  find  another  Madeline 
Swan  !  You  must  have  been  reading  a  great  deal 
this  summer,  Mr.  Barker,"  she  said,  in  turning  upon 
him  from  her  bereavement.  "Have  you  seen  any 
of  the  old  boarders  1  Or  Mrs.  Harmon  ?  I  shall 
never  have  another  winter  like  that  at  the  poor  old 
St.  Albans  ! " 

Lemuel  made  what  answer  he  could.  There  was 
happiness  enough  in  merely  being  with  her  to  have 
counterbalanced  all  the  pain  he  was  suffering ;  and 
when  she  made  him  partner  of  her  interests  and 
associations,  and  appealed  to  their  common  memories 
in  confidence  of  his  sympathy,  his  heavy  heart  stirred 
with  strange  joy.  He  had  supposed  that  Berry  must 
have  warned  her  against  him ;  but  she  was  treating 
him  as  if  he  had  not.  Perhaps  he  had  not,  and 
perhaps  he  had  done  so,  and  this  was  her  way  of 
showing  that  she  did  not  believe  it.  He  tried  to 
think  so ;  he  knew  it  was  a  subterfuge,  but  he 
lingered  in  it  with  a  fleeting,  fearful  pleasure.  They 
had  crossed  from  the  Common  and  were  walking  up 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  399 

under  the  lindens  of  Chestnut  Street,  and  from  time 
to  time  they  stopped,  in  the  earnestness  of  their 
parley,  and  stood  talking,  and  then  loitered  on  again 
in  the  summer  security  from  oversight  which  they 
were  too  rapt  to  recognise.  They  reached  the  top  of 
the  hill,  and  came  to  a  door  where  she  stopped.  He 
fell  back  a  pace.  "  Good-bye—  It  was  eternal 

loss,  but  it  was  escape. 

She  smiled  in  timorous  hesitation.  "  Won't  you 
come  in  \  And  I  will  get  Mr.  Berry's  letter." 

She  opened  the  door  with  a  latch-key,  and  he 
followed  her  within  ;  a  servant-girl  came  half-way 
up  the  basement  stairs  to  see  who  it  was,  and  then 
wenfr  down.  She  left  him  in  the  dim  parlour  a 
moment,  while  she  went  to  get  the  letter.  When 
she  returned,  "I  have  a  little  room  for  my  work  at 
the  top  of  the  house,"  she  said,  "  but  it  will  never  be 
like  the  St.  Albans.  There  's  no  one  else  here  yet, 
and  it 's  pretty  lonesome — without  Madeline." 

x  She  sank  into  a  chair,  but  he  remained  standing, 
and  seemed  not  to  heed  her  when  she  asked  him  to 
sit  down.  He  put  Berry's  letter  into  his  pocket 
without  looking  at  it,  and  she  rose  again. 

She  must  have  thought  he  was  going,  and  she 
said  with  a  smile  of  gentle  trust,  "It's  been  like 
having  last  winter  back  again  to  see  you.  We 
thought  you  must  have  gone  home  right  after  the 
fire  ;  we  didn't  see  anything  of  you  again.  We  went 
ourselves  in  about  a  week." 

Then  she  did  not  know,  and  he  must  tell  her 
himself. 


400  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"  Did  Mr.  Berry  say  anything  about  me— at  the 
fire— that  last  day  1 "  he  began  bluntly. 

"  No  ! "  she  said,  looking  at  him  with  surprise ; 
there  was  a  new  sound  in  his  voice.  "  He  had  no 
need  to  say  anything !  I  wanted  to  tell  you— to 
write  and  tell  you— how  much  I  honoured  you  for 
it — how  ashamed  I  was  for  misunderstanding  you 
just  before,  when " 

He  knew  that  she  meant  when  they  all  pitied  him 
for  a  coward. 

Her  voice  trembled ;  he  could  tell  that  the  tears 
were  in  her  eyes.  He  tried  to  put  the  sweetness  of 
her  praise  from  him.  "Oh,  it  wasn't  that  that  I 
meant,"  he  groaned;  and  he  wrenched  the  words 
out.  "  That  fellow,  who  said  he  was  a  friend  of  mine, 
and  got  into  the  house  that  way,  was  a  thief ;  and 
Mr.  Berry  caught  him  robbing  his  room  the  day  of 
the  fire,  and  treated  me  as  if  I  knew  it  and  was 
helping  him  on— 

"  Oh  ! "  cried  the  girl.  "  How  cruel !  How  could 
lie  do  that  ?  " 

Lemuel  could  not  suffer  himself  to  take  refuge  in 
her  generous  faith  now. 

"  When  I  first  came  to  Boston,  I  had  my  money 
stolen,  and  there  were  two  days  when  I  had  nothing 
to  eat ;  and  then  I  was  arrested  by  mistake  for 
stealing  a  girl's  satchel ;  and  when  I  was  acquitted, 
I  slept  the  next  night  in  the  tramp's  lodging-house, 
and  that  fellow  was  there,  arid  when  he  came  to  the 
St.  Albans  I  was  ashamed  to  tell  where  I  had  known 
him,  and  so  I  let  him  pass  himself  off  for  my  friend." 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     401 

He  kept  his  eyes  fixed  on  hers,  bat  he  could  not 
see  them  change  from  their  pity  of  him,  or  light  up 
with  a  sense  of  any  squalor  in  his  history. 

"And  I  used  to  think  that  my  life  had  been 
hard  !  "  she  cried.  "  Oh,  how  much  you  have  been 
through  ! " 

"  And  after  that,"  he  pursued,  "  Mr.  Sewell  got  me 
a  place,  a  sort  of  servant's  place,  and  when  I  lost  that 
I  came  to  be  the  man-of-all  work  at  the  St.  Albans." 

In  her  eyes  the  pity  was  changing  to  admiration  ; 
his  confession  which  he  had  meant  to  be  so  abject 
had  kindled  her  fancy  like  a  boastful  tale. 

"How  little  we  know  about  people  and  what 
they  have  suffered  !  But  I  thank  you  for  telling  me 
this — oh  yes  ! — and  I  shall  always  think  of  myself 
with  contempt.  How  easy  and  pleasant  my  life 
has  been  !  And  you — 

She  stopped,  and  he  stood  helpless  against  her 
misconception.  He  told  her  about  the  poverty  he 
had  left  at  home,  and  the  wretched  circumstance  of 
his  life,  but  she  could  not  see  it  as  anything  but 
honourable  to  his  present  endeavour.  She  listened 
with  breathless  interest  to  it  all,  and,  "  Well,"  she 
sighed  at  last,  "  it  will  always  be  something  for  you 
to  look  back  to,  and  be  proud  of.  And  that  girl — 
did  she  never  say  or  do  anything  to  show  that  she 
was  sorry  for  that  cruel  mistake  1  Did  you  ever  see 
her  afterwards  1 " 

"Yes,"  said  Lemuel,  sick  at  heart,  and  feeling  how 
much  more  triumphantly  he  could  have  borne 
ignominy  and  rejection  than  this  sweet  sympathy. 
2c 


402  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

She  seemed  to  think  he  would  say  something  more, 
but  he  turned  away  from  her,  and  after  a  little 
silence  of  expectance  she  let  him  go,  with  promises 
to  come  again,  which  she  seemed  to  win  from  him 
for  his  own  sake. 

In  the  street  he  took  out  Berry's  letter  and  read 
it. 

"  DEAR  OLD  MAN,— I  Ve  been  trying  to  get  off  a  letter  to 
you  almost  any  time  the  last  three  months  ;  but  I  've  been 
round  so  much,  and  upside  down  so  much  since  I  saw  you — 
out  to  W.  T.  and  on  my  head  in  Western  Mass. — that  I've 
not  been  able  to  fetch  it.  I  don't  know  as  I  could  fetch  it 
now,  if  it  wasn't  for  the  prospective  Mrs.  A.  W.  B.,  Jr., 
standing  over  me  with  a  revolver,  and  waiting  to  see  me  do 
it.  I  've  just  been  telling  her  about  that  little  interview  of 
ours  with  Williams,  that  day,  and  she  thinks  I  ought  to  be 
man  enough  to  write  and  say  that  I  guess  I  was  all  wrong 
about  you  ;  I  had  a  sneaking  idea  of  the  kind  from  the  start 
almost,  but  if  a  fellow  's  proud  at  all,  he  's  proiul  of  his  mis 
takes,  and  he  hates  to  give  them  up.  I  'm  pretty  badly  balled 
lip  now,  and  I  can't  seem  to  get  the  right  words  aboub 
remorse,  and  so  forth  ;  but  you  know  how  it  is  yourself.  I 
am  sorry,  there  's  no  two  ways  about  that  ;  but  I  've  kept 
my  suspicions  as  well  as  my  regrets  to  myself,  and  now  I  do 
the  best  thing  I  can  by  way  of  reparation.  I  send  this  letter 
by  Miss  Carver.  She  hasn't  read  it,  and  she  don't  know 
what  it 's  all  about ;  but  I  guess  you  'd  better  tell  her. 
Don't  spare,  yours  truly,  A.  W.  BERRY,  JR." 

The  letter  did  not  soften  Lemuel  at  all  towards 
Berry,  and  he  was  bitterly  proud  that  he  had  spoken 
without  this  bidding,  though  he  had  seemed  to 
speak  to  no  end  that  he  had  expected.  After  a 
while  he  lost  himself  in  his  day-dreams  again,  and  in 
the  fantastic  future  which  he  built  up  this  became  a 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  403 

great  source  of  comfort  to  him  and  to  his  ideal. 
Now  he  parted  with  her  in  sublime  renunciation, 
and  now  he  triumphed  over  all  the  obstacles  between 
them ;  but  whatever  turn  he  willed  his  fortunes  to 
take,  she  still  praised  him,  and  he  prided  himself 
that  he  had  shown  himself  at  his  worst  to  her  of  his 
own  free  impulse.  Sewell  praised  him  for  it  in  his 
reverie ;  Mr.  Corey  and  Mr.  Bellingham  both  made 
him  delicate  compliments  upon  his  noble  behaviour, 
which  he  feigned  had  somehow  become  known  to 
them. 


XXIX. 

AT  the  usual  hour  he  was  at  Mr.  Corey's  house, 
where  he  arrived  footsore,  and  empty  from  supper- 
less  wanderings,  but  not  hungry  and  not  weary. 
The  serving-man  at  the  door  met  him  with  the 
message  that  Mr.  Corey  had  gone  to  dine  at  his  club, 
and  would  not  be  at  home  till  late.  He  gave 
Lemuel  a  letter,  which  had  all  the  greater  effect  from 
being  presented  to  him  on  the  little  silver  tray 
employed  to  bring  up  the  cards  and  notes  of  the 
visitors  and  correspondents  of  the  family.  The 
envelope  was  stamped  in  that  ephemeral  taste  which 
configured  the  stationery  of  a  few  years  ago,  with  the 
lines  of  alligator  leather,  and  it  exhaled  a  perfume 
so  characteristic  that  it  seemed  to  breathe  Statira 
visibly  before  him.  He  knew  this  far  better  than 
the  poor,  scrawly,  uncultivated  handwriting  which 
he  had  seen  so  little.  He  took  the  letter,  and  turn 
ing  from  the  door  read  it  by  the  light  of  the  next 
street  lamp. 

"  DEAR  LEMUEL— Manda  Grier  has  told  me  what  she  said 
to  you  and  Ime  about  crazy  about  it  dear  Lem  I  want  you 
should  come  and  see  mee  0  Lem  you  dont  Suppose  i  could 

404 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  405 

of  let  Manda  Grier  talk  to  you  that  way  if  I  had  of  none  it 
but  of  course  you  dident  only  do  Say  so  I  give  her  a  real 
good  goen  over  and  she  says  shes  sory  she  done  it  i  dont  want 
any  body  should  care  for  mee  without  itse  there  free  will 
but  I  shall  alwayes  care  for  you  if  you  dont  care  for  me  dont 
come  but  if  you  do  Care  I  want  you  should  come  as  soon  as 
ever  you  can  I  can  explane  everything  Mauda  Grier  dident 
mean  anything  but  for  the  best  but  sometimes  she  dont  know 
what  she  is  sayin  O  Lem  you  mussent  be  mad  But  if  you  are 
and  you  dont  want  to  come  ennymore  dont  come  But  O  i 
hope  you  wouldent  let  such  a  thing  set  you  againste  mee 
recollect  that  I  never  done  or  Said  anything  to  set  you 
against  me 

"STATIRA." 

A  cruel  disgust  mingled  with  the  remorse  that  this 
letter  brought  him.  Its  illiteracy  made  him  ashamed, 
and  the  helpless  fondness  it  expressed  was  like  a 
millstone  hanged  about  his  neck.  He  felt  the 
deadly  burden  of  it  drag  him  down 

A  passer-by  on  the  other  side  of  the  street  coughed 
slightly  in  the  night  air,  and  a  thought  flashed 
through  Lemuel,  from  which  he  cowered,  as  if  he  had 
found  himself  lifting  his  hand  against  another's  life. 

His  impulse  was  to  turn  and  run,  but  there  was 
nc  escape  on  any  side.  It  seemed  to  him  that  he 
was  like  that  prisoner  he  had  read  of,  who  saw  the 
walls  of  his  cell  slowly  closing  together  upon  him, 
and  drawing  nearer  and  nearer  till  they  should  crush 
him  between  them.  The  inexperience  of  youth 
denies  it  perspective  ;  in  that  season  of  fleeting  and 
unsubstantial  joys,  of  feverish  hopes,  despair  wholly 
darkens  a  world  which  after  years  find  full  of  chances 
and  expedients. 


406  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

If  Mr.  Sewell  had  been  in  town  there  might  have 
been  some  hope  through  him  ;  or  if  Mr.  Evans  were 
there  ;  or  even  if  Berry  were  at  hand,  it  would  be 
some  one  to  advise  with,  to  open  his  heart  to  in 
his  extremity.  He  walked  down  into  Bolingbroke 
Street,  knowing  well  that  Mr.  Sewell  was  not  at 
home,  but  pretending  to  himself,  after  the  fashion  of 
the  young,  that  if  he  should  see  a  light  in  his  house 
it  would  be  a  sign  that  all  should  come  out  right  with 
him,  and  if  not,  it  would  come  out  wrong.  He  would 
not  let  himself  lift  his  eyes  to  the  house  front  till  he 
arrived  before  it.  When  he  looked  his  heart  stood 
still ;  a  light  streamed  bright  and  strong  from  the 
drawing-room  window. 

He  hurried  across  the  street,  and  rang ;  and  after 
some  delay,  in  which  the  person  coming  to  the  door 
took  time  to  light  the  gas  in  the  hall,  Mr.  Sewell 
himself  opened  to  him.  They  stood  confronted  in 
mutual  amazement,  and  then  Sewell  said,  with  a 
cordiality  which  he  did  not  keep  free  from  reluctance, 
"  Oh— Mr.  Barker  !  Come  in  !  Come  in  !  "  But 
after  they  had  shaken  hands,  and  Lemuel  had  come 
in,  he  stood  there  in  the  hall  with  him,  and  did  not 
offer  to  take  him  up  to  his  study.  "I  'm  so  glad  to 
have  this  glimpse  of  you  !  How  in  the  world  did 
you  happen  to  come  1 " 

"  I  was  passing  and  saw  the  light,"  said  Lemuel. 

Sewell  laughed.  "  To  be  sure  !  We  never  have  any 
idea  how  far  our  little  candle  throws  its  beams  !  I  'm 
just  here  for  the  night,  on  my  way  from  the  mountains 
to  the  sea  ;  I  'm  to  be  the  *  supply '  in  a  friend's 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     407 

pulpit  at  New  Bedford  ;  and  I  'm  here  quite  alone  in 
the  house,  scrambling  a  sermon  together.  But  I  'm 
so  glad  to  see  you  !  You  're  well,  I  hope  ?  You  're 
looking  a  little  thin,  but  that 's  no  harm.  Do  you 
enjoy  your  life  with  Mr.  Corey  1  I  was  sure  you 
would  !  When  you  come  to  know  him,  you  will  find 
him  one  of  the  best  of  men — kindly,  thoughtful,  and 
sympathetic.  I  Ve  felt  very  comfortable  about  your 
being  with  him  whenever  I  Ve  thought  of  you,  and 
you  may  be  sure  that  I've  thought  of  you  often. 
What  about  our  friends  of  the  St.  Albans  1  Do  you 
see  Mrs.  Harmon  ?  You  knew  the  Evanses  had 
gone  to  Europe." 

"Yes  ;  I  got  a  letter  from  him  yesterday." 

"  He  didn't  pick  up  so  fast  as  they  hoped,  and  he 
concluded  to  try  the  voyage.  I  hear  very  good 
accounts  of  him.  He  said  he  was  going  to  write 
you.  Well !  And  Mr.  Corey  is  well  ? "  He  smiled 
more  beamingly  upon  Lemuel,  who  felt  that  he 
wished  him  to  go,  and  stood  haplessly  trying  to  get 
away. 

In  the  midst  of  his  own  uneasiness  Sewell  noted 
Lemuel's.  "  Is  there  anything — something — you 
wished  to  speak  with  me  about  1 " 

"  No.  No,  not  anything  in  particular.  I  just 
saw  the  light,  and " 

Sewell  took  his  hand  and  wrung  it  with  affection. 

"It  was  so  good  of  you  to  run  in  and  see  me. 
Don't  fancy  it 's  been  any  disturbance.  I  'd  got  into 
rather  a  dim  place  in  my  work,  but  since  I  Ve  been 
standing  here  with  you — ha,  ha,  ha  !  those  things  do 


408  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE ;   OR, 

happen  so  curiously  ! — the  whole  thing  has  become 
perfectly  luminous.  I'm  delighted  you're  getting 
on  so  nicely.  Give  my  love  to  Mr.  Corey.  I  shall 
see  you  soon  again.  We  shall  all  be  back  in  a  little 
over  a  fortnight.  Glad  of  this  moment  with  you,  if 
it 's  only  a  moment !  Good-bye  ! " 

He  wrung  Lemuel's  hand  again,  this  time  in 
perfect  sincerity,  and  eagerly  shut  him  out  into  the 
night. 

The  dim  place  had  not  become  so  luminous  to 
him  as  it  had  to  the  minister.  A  darkness,  which 
the  obscurity  of  the  night  faintly  typified,  closed 
round  him,  pierced  by  one  ray  only,  and  from  this 
he  tried  to  turn  his  face.  It  was  the  gleam  that 
lights  up  every  labyrinth  where  our  feet  wander  and 
stumble,  but  it  is  not  always  easy  to  know  it  from 
those  false  lights  of  feeble -hearted  pity,  of  mock- 
sacrifice,  of  sick  conscience,  which  dance  before  us  to 
betray  to  worse  misery" yet. 

Some  sense  of  this,  broken  and  faltering,  reached 
Lemuel  where  he  stood,  and  tried  to  deal  faithfully 
with  his  problem.  In  that  one  steadfast  ray  he  saw 
that  whatever  he  did  he  must  not  do  it  for  himself ; 
but  what  his  duty  was  he  could  not  make  out.  He 
knew  now,  if  he  had  not  known  before,  that  what 
ever  his  feeling  for  Statira  was,  he  had  not  released 
himself  from  her,  and  it  seemed  to  him  that  he  could 
not  release  himself  by  any  concern  for  his  own  ad 
vantage.  That  notion  with  which  he  had  so  long 
played,  her  insufficiency  for  his  life  now  and  for  the 
needs  of  his  mind  hereafter,  revealed  itself  in  its  real 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     409 

cruelty.  The  things  that  Mr.  Sewell  had  said,  that 
his  mother  had  said,  that  Berry  had  said,  in  what 
seemed  a  fatal  succession,  and  all  to  the  same  effect, 
against  throwing  himself  away  upon  some  one  in 
adequate  to  him  at  his  best,  fell  to  the  ground  like 
withered  leaves,  and  the  fire  of  that  steadfast  ray 
consumed  them. 

But  whom  to  turn  to  for  counsel  now  1  The  one 
friend  in  whom  he  had  trusted,  to  whom  he  had  just 
gone,  ready  to  fling  down  his  whole  heart  before  him, 
had  failed  him,  failed  him  unwittingly,  unwillingly, 
as  he  had  failed  him  once  before,  but  this  time  in 
infinitely  greater  stress.  He  did  not  blame  him  now, 
fiercely,  proudly,  as  he  had  once  blamed  him,  but 
again  he  wandered  up  and  down  the  city  streets, 
famished  and  outcast  through  his  defection. 

It  was  late  when  he  went  home,  but  Mr.  Corey 
had  not  yet  returned,  and  he  had  time  to  sit  down 
and  write  the  letter  which  he  had  decided  to  send  to 
Statira,  instead  of  going  to  see  her.  It  was  not 
easy  to  write,  but  after  many  attempts  he  wrote  it. 

DEAR  STATIRA, — You  must  not  be  troubled,  at  what 
Amanda  said  to  me.  I  assure  you  that,  although  I  was 
angry  at  first,  I  am  entirely  willing  to  overlook  it  at  your 
request.  She  probably  spoke  hastily,  and  I  am  now  con 
vinced  that  she  spoke  without  your  authority.  You  must 
not  think  that  I  am  provoked  at  you. 

"  I  received  your  letter  this  evening;  and  I  will  come  to 
see  you  very  soon.  LEMUEL  BARKER." 

The  letter  was  colder  than  he  meant  to  make  it, 
but  he  felt  that  he  must  above  all  be  honest,  and  he 


410  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

did  not  see  how  he  could  honestly  make  it  less  cold. 
When  it  came  to  Statira's  hands  she  read  it  silently 
to  herself,  over  and  over  again,  while  her  tears 
dripped  upon  it. 

'Manda  Grier  was  by,  and  she  watched  her  till 
she  could  bear  the  sight  no  longer.  She  snatched 
the  letter  from  the  girl's  hands  and  ran  it  through, 
and  then  she  flung  it  on  the  ground.  u  Nasty,  cold- 
hearted,  stuck-up,  shameless  thing  !  " 

uOh,  don't,  'Manda;  don't,  'Manda ! "  sobbed 
Statira,  and  she  plunged  her  face  into  the  pillows 
of  the  bed,  where  she  sat. 

"  Shameless,  cold-hearted,  stuck-np,  nasty  thing ! " 
said  'Manda  Grier,  varying  her  denunciation  in  the 
repetition,  and  apparently  getting  fresh  satisfaction 
out  of  it  in  that  way.  "Don't  1  St'ira  Dudley,  if 
you  was  a  woman — if  you  was  half  a  woman— you  'd 
never  speak  to  that  little  corpse-on-ice  again." 

"  0  'Manda,  don't  call  him  names  !  I  can't  bear 
to  have  you  !  " 

"  Names  1  If  you  was  anybody  at  all,  you 
wouldn't  look  at  him  !  You  wouldn't  think  of  him  ! " 

"  0  'Manda,  7Manda !  You  know  I  can't  let 
you  talk  so,"  moaned  Statira. 

"  Talk  ?  I  could  talk  my  head  off !  '  You  must 
not  think  I  was  provoked  with  you,'  "  she  mimicked 
Lemuel's  dignity  of  diction  in  mincing  falsetto.  "  'I 
will  come  to  see  you  very  soon/  Miserable,  worth 
less,  conceited  whipper-snapper ! " 

"  O  'Manda,  you  '11  break  my  heart  if  you  go  on 
so!" 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  4 1 1 

"  Well,  then,  give  him  up  !  He 's  goin'  to  give 
you  up." 

"  Oh,  he  ain't ;  you  know  he  ain't !  He  's  just 
busy,  and  I  know  he  '11  come.  I  '11  bet  you  he  '11  be 
here  to-morrow.  It  '11  kill  me  to  give  him  up." 

She  had  lifted  herself  from  the  pillow,  and  she 
began  to  cough. 

"He'll  kill  you  anyway,"  cried  'Manda  Grier,  in 
a  passion  of  pity  and  remorse.  She  ran  across  the 
room  to  get  the  medicine  which  Statira  had  to  take 
in  these  paroxysms.  "  There,  there  !  Take  it !  I 
sha'n't  say  anything  more  about  him." 

"  And  do  you  take  it  all  back  ?"  gasped  Statira, 
holding  the  proffered  spoon  away. 

"Yes,  yes  !  But  do  take  your  med'cine,  St'ira,  'f 
you  don't  want  to  die  where  you  set." 

"  And  do  you  think  he  '11  come  1  " 

"  Yes,  he  '11  come." 

"  Do  you  say  it  just  to  get  me  to  take  the 
medicine  ? " 

"No,  I  really  do  believe  he'll  come." 

"  0  'Manda,  'Manda ! "  Statira  took  her  medi 
cine,  and  then  wildly  flung  her  arms  round  'Manda 
Grier's  neck,  and  began  to  sob  and  to  cry  there. 
"  Oh,  how  hard  I  am  with  you,  'Manda  !  I  should 
think  if  /  was  as  hard  with  everybody  else,  they  'd 
perfectly  hate  me." 

"  You  hard  ! " 

"  Yes,  and  that 's  why  he  hates  me.  He  does 
hate  me.  You  said  he  did." 

"  No,  St'ira,  I  didn't.     You  never  was  hard  to 


412  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE. 

anybody,  and  the  meanest  old  iceberg  in   creation 
couldn't  hate  you." 

"  Then  you  think  he  does  care  for  me  ? 

"  Yes." 

"  And  you  know  he  '11  come  soon  1  " 

"Yes." 

"  To-morrow  1 " 

"  Yes,  to-morrow." 

"O'Manda,  O'Mandal" 


XXX. 

LEMUEL  had  promised  himself  that  if  he  could 
gain  a  little  time  he  should  be  able  better  to  decide 
what  it  was  right  for  him  to  do.  His  heart  lifted 
as  he  dropped  the  letter  into  the  box,  and  he  went 
through  the  chapters  which  Mr.  Corey  asked  him  to 
read,  after  he  came  in,  with  an  ease  incredible  to 
himself.  In  the  morning  he  woke  with  a  mind  that 
was  almost  cheerful.  He  had  been  honest  in  writing 
that  letter,  and  so  far  he  had  done  right ;  he  should 
keep  his  word  about  going  soon  to  see  Statira,  and  that 
would  be  honest  too.  He  did  not  look  beyond  this 
decision,  and  he  felt,  as  we  all  do,  more  or  less 
vaguely  when  we  have  resolved  to  do  right,  that  he 
had  the  merit  of  a  good  action. 

Statira  showed  herself  so  glad  to  see  him  that 
he  could  not  do  less  than  seem  to  share  her  joy  in 
their  making-up,  as  she  called  it,  though  he  insisted 
that  there  had  been  no  quarrel  between  them  ;  and 
now  there  began  for  him  a  strange  double  life,  the 
fact  of  which  each  reader  must  reject  or  accept 
according  to  the  witness  of  his  own  knowledge. 

He  renewed  as  far  as  he  could  the  old  warmth  of 

413 


414  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

his  feeling  for  Statira,  and  in  his  compunction 
experienced  a  tenderness  for  her  that  he  had  not 
known  before,  the  strange  tenderness  that  some 
spirits  feel  for  those  they  injure.  He  went  oftener 
than  ever  to  see  her,  he  was  very  good  to  her,  and 
cheered  her  with  his  interest  in  all  her  little 
interests  ;  he  petted  her  and  comforted  her ;  but  he 
escaped  from  her  as  soon  as  he  could,  and  when  he 
shut  her  door  behind  him  he  shut  her  within  it. 
He  made  haste  to  forget  her,  and  to  lose  himself  in 
thoughts  that  were  never  wholly  absent  even  in 
her  presence.  Sometimes  he  went  directly  from  her 
to  Jessie,  whose  innocent  Bohemianism  kept  later 
hours,  and  who  was  always  glad  to  see  him  when 
ever  he  came.  She  welcomed  him  with  talk  that 
they  thought  related  wholly  to  the  books  they  had 
been  reading,  and  to  the  things  of  deep  psychological 
import  which  they  suggested.  He  seldom  came  to 
her  without  the  excuse  of  a  book  to  be  lent  or  bor 
rowed;  and  he  never  quitted  her  without  feeling 
inspired  with  the  wish  to  know  more,  and  to  be 
more ;  he  seemed  to  be  lifted  to  purer  and  clearer 
regions  of  thought  She  received  him  in  the  parlour, 
but  their  evenings  commonly  ended  in  her  little 
studio,  whither  some  errand  took  them,  or  some  in 
trusion  of  the  other  boarders  banished  them.  There 
he  read  to  her  poems  or  long  chapters  out  of  the 
essayists  or  romancers ;  or  else  they  sat  and  talked 
about  the  strange  things  they  had  noticed  in  them 
selves  that  were  like  the  things  they  found  in  their 
books.  Once  when  they  had  talked  a  long  while  in 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     415 

this  strain,  he  told  how  when  he  first  saw  her  he 
thought  she  was  very  proud  and  cold. 

She  laughed  gaily.  "  And  I  used  to  be  afraid  of 
you,"  she  said.  "You  used  to  be  always  reading 
there  in  your  little  office.  Do  you  think  I  'm  very 
proud  now  ? " 

"  Are  you  very  much  afraid  of  me  now  ? "  he 
retorted. 

They  laughed  together. 

"  Isn't  it  strange,"  she  said,  "  how  little  we  really 
know  about  people  in  the  world  ?  " 

"  Yes,"  he  answered.  "  I  wonder  if  it  will  ever 
be  different  I  Ve  been  wrong  about  nearly  every 
one  I  Ve  met  since  I  came  to  Boston." 

"  And  I  have  too  ! "  she  cried,  with  that  delight 
in  the  coincidence  of  experience  which  the  young 
feel  so  keenly. 

He  had  got  the  habit,  with  his  growing  ease  in 
her  presence,  of  walking  up  and  down  the  room,  while 
she  sat,  with  her  arms  lifted  and  clasped  above  her 
head,  forgetful  of  everything  but  the  things  they 
were  saying,  and  followed  him  with  her  eyes.  As 
he  turned  about  in  his  walk,  he  saw  how  pretty  she 
was,  with  her  slender  form  cased  in  the  black  silk 
she  wore,  and  thrown  into  full  relief  by  the  lifted 
arms  ;  he  saw  the  little  hands  knit  above  her  head, 
and  white  as  flowers  on  her  dark  hair.  Her  eyes 
were  very  bright,  and  her  soft  lips,  small  and  fine, 
were  red. 

He  faltered,  and  lost  the  thread  of  his  speech.  "  I 
forgot  what  I  was  going  to  say  ! " 


416  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

She  took  down  her  hands  to  clasp  them  over  her 
laughing  face  a  moment.  "  And  I  don't  remember 
what  you  were  saying!"  They  both  laughed  a 
long  time  at  this;  it  seemed  incomparably  droll, 
and  they  became  better  comrades. 

They  spent  the  rest  of  the  evening  in  laughing 
and  joking. 

"  I  didn't  know  you  were  so  fond  of  laughing,"  he 
said,  when  he  went  away. 

"And  I  always  supposed  you  were  very  solemn," 
she  replied. 

This  again  seemed  the  drollest  thing  in  the  world. 

'  Well,  I  always  was,"  he  said. 

"  And  I  don't  know  when  I  Ve  aughed  so  much 
before  !  "  She  stood  at  the  head  of  the  stairs,  and 
held  her  lamp  up  for  him  to  find  his  way  down. 

Again  looking  back,  he  saw  her  in  the  undefended 
grace  that  had  bewildered  him  before. 

When  he  came  next  they  met  very  seriousiy,  but 
before  the  evening  was  past  they  were  laughing 
together  ;  and  so  it  happened  now  whenever  he 
came.  They  both  said  how  strange  it  was  that 
laughing  with  any  one  seemed  to  make  you  feel  so 
much  better  acquainted.  She  told  of  a  girl  at  school 
that  she  had  always  disliked  till  one  day  something 
made  them  laugh,  and  after  that  they  became  the 
greatest  friends. 

He  tried  to  think  of  some  experience  to  match 
this,  but  he  could  not ;  he  asked  her  if  she  did  not 
think  that  you  always  felt  a  little  gloomy  after  you 
had  been  laughing  a  great  deal.  She  said  yes; 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  417 

after  that  first  night  when  they  laughed  so,  she  felt 
so  depressed  that  she  was  sure  she  was  going  to 
have  bad  news  from  Madeline.  Then  she  said  she 
had  received  a  letter  from  Madeline  that  morning, 
and  she  and  Mr.  Berry  had  both  wished  her  to  give 
him  their  regards  if  she  ever  saw  him.  This,  when 
she  had  said  it,  seemed  a  very  good  joke  too ;  and 
they  laughed  at  it  a  little  consciously,  till  he  boldly 
bade  her  tell  them  he  came  so  very  seldom  that  she 
did  not  know  when  she  could  deliver  their  message. 

She  answered  that  she  was  afraid  Madeline  would 
not  believe  that ;  and  then  it  came  out  that  he  had 
never  replied  to  Berry's  letter. 

She  said,  "  Oh  !  Is  that  the  way  you  treat  your 
correspondents  1 "  and  he  was  ashamed  to  confess 
that  he  had  not  forgiven  Berry. 

"  I  will  write  to  him  to-night,  if  you  say  so,"  he 
answered  hardily. 

"  Oh,  you  must  do  what  you  think  best,"  she  said, 
lightly  refusing  the  responsibility. 

"Whatever  you  say  will  be  best,"  he  said,  with  a 
sudden,  passionate  fervour  that  surprised  himself. 

She  tried  to  escape  from  it.  "  Am  I  so  infallible 
as  that  ? " 

"  You  are  for  me  !  "  he  retorted. 

A  silence  followed,  which  she  endeavoured  to 
break,  but  she  sat  still  across  the  little  table  from 
him  where  the  shaded  lamp  spread  its  glow,  leaving 
the  rest  of  the  room,  with  its  red  curtains  and 
its  sketches  pinned  about,  in  a  warm, '  luxurious 
shadow.  Her  eyes  fell,  and  she  did  not  speak. 
2D 


418  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

"  It  must  sound  very  strange  to  you,  I  know,"  he 
went  on  ;  "  and  it  Js  strange  to  me,  too  ;  but  it  seems 
to  me  that  there  isn't  anything  I  've  done  without 
my  thinking  whether  you  would  like  me  to  do  it," 

She  rose  involuntarily.  "  You  make  me  ashamed 
to  think  that  you  're  so  much  mistaken  about  me  ! 
I  know  how  we  all  influence  each  other — I  know  I 
always  try  to  be  what  I  think  people  expect  me  to 
be — I  can't  be  myself — I  know  what  you  mean ;  but 

you — you  must  be  yourself,  and  not  let "  She 

stopped  in  her  wandering  speech,  in  strange  agitation, 
and  he  rose  too. 

"  I  hope  you  're  not  offended  with  me  ! " 

"  Offended  <!,     Why  1     Why  do  you— go  so  soon  1 " 

"  I  thought  you  were  going,"  he  answered  stupidly. 

"Why,  I'm  athomef" 

They  looked  at  each  other,  and  then  they  broke 
into  a  happy  laugh. 

"  Sit  down  again  !  I  don't  know  what  I  got  up 
for.  It  must  have  been  to  make  some  tea.  Did 
you  know  Madeline  had  bequeathed  me  her  tea 
kettle — the  one  we  had  at  the  St.  Albans  1  "  She 
bustled  about,  and  lit  the  spirit-lamp  under  the 
kettle. 

"Blow  out  that  match!"  he  cried.  "You'll  set 
your  dress  on  fire !  "  He  caught  her  hand,  which 
she  was  holding  with  the  lighted  match  in  it  at  her 
side,  after  the  manner  of  women  with  lighted  matches, 
and  blew  it  out  himself. 

"  Oh,  thank  you  ! "  she  said  indifferently.  "  Can 
you  take  it  without  milk  ?  " 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  419 

"  Yes,  I  like  it  so." 

She  got  out  two  of  the  cups  he  remembered,  and 
he  said,  "  How  much  like  last  winter  that  seems  ! " 

And  "Yes,  doesn't  it  ?  "  she  sighed. 

The  lamp  purred  and  fretted  under  the  kettle,  and 
in  the  silence  in  which  they  waited,  the  elm  tree 
that  rose  from  the  pavement  outside  seemed  to  look 
in  consciously  upon  them. 

When  the  kettle  began  to  sing,  she  poured  out 
the  two  cups  of  tea,  and  in  handing  him  his  their 
fingers  touched,  and  she  gave  a  little  outcry.  "  Oh  ! 
Madeline's  precious  cup  !  I  thought  it  was  going  to 
drop  ! " 

The  soft  night-wind  blew  in  through  the  elm  leaves, 
and  their  rustling  seemed  the  expression  of  a  pro 
found  repose,  an  endless  content. 


XXXI. 

THE  next  night  Lemuel  went  to  see  Statira,  with 
out  promising  himself  what  he  should  say  or  do, 
but  if  he  were  to  tell  her  everything,  he  felt  that 
she  would  forgive  him  more  easily  than  'Manda 
Grier.  He  was  aware  that  'Manda  always  lay  in 
wait  for  him,  to  pierce  him  at  every  undefended 
point  of  conscience.  Since  the  first  break  with  her, 
there  had  never  been  peace  between  them,  and  per 
haps  not  kindness  for  long  before  that.  Whether  or 
not  she  felt  responsible  for  having  promoted  Statira's 
affair  with  him,  and  therefore  bound  to  guard  her  to 
the  utmost  from  suffering  by  it,  she  seemed  always  to 
be  on  the  alert  to  seize  any  advantage  against  him. 
Sometimes  Statira  accused  her  of  trying  to  act  so 
hatefully  to  him  that  he  would  never  come  any  more  ; 
she  wildly  blamed  her ;  but  the  faithful  creature 
was  none  the  less  constant  and  vigilant  on  that 
account.  She  took  patiently  the  unjust  reproaches 
which  Statira  heaped  upon  her  like  a  wayward  child, 
and  remitted  nothing  of  her  suspicion  or  enmity 
towards  Lemuel.  Once,  when  she  had  been  very 
bitter  with  him,  so  bitter  that  it  had  ended  in  an 

420 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     421 

open  quarrel  between  them,  Statira  sided  with  him 
against  her,  and  when  'Manda  Grier  flounced  out  of 
the  room  she  offered  him,  if  he  wished,  to  break  with 
her,  and  never  to  speak  to  her  again,  or  have  any 
thing  more  to  do  with  such  a  person.  But  at  this 
his  anger  somehow  fell;  and  he  said  no,  she  must 
not  think  of  such  a  thing ;  that  'Manda  Grier  had 
been  her  friend  long  before  he  was,  and  that,  what 
ever  she  said  to  him,  she  was  always  good  and  true 
to  her.  Then  Statira  fell  upon  his  neck  and  cried, 
and  praised  him,  and  said  he  was  a  million  times 
more  to  her  than  'Manda  Grier,  but  she  would 
do  whatever  he  said ;  and  he  went  away  sick  at 
heart. 

When  he  came  now,  with  his  thoughts  clinging  to 
Jessie,  'Manda  Grier  hardly  gave  him  time  for  the 
decencies  of  greeting.  She  was  in  a  high  nervous 
exaltation,  and  Statira  looked  as  if  she  had  been 
crying. 

"  What 's  become  o'  them  art-students  you  used  to 
have  't  the  St.  Albans  1 "  she  began,  her  whopper- 
jaw  twitching  with  excitement,  and  her  eyes  glaring 
vindictively  upon  Lemuel. 

He  had  sat  down  near  Statira  on  the  lounge,  but 
she  drew  a  little  away  from  him  in  a  provisional 
fashion,  as  if  she  would  first  see  what  came  of 
'Manda  Grier's  inquisition. 

"  Art-students  1"  he  repeated  aimlessly  while  he 
felt  his  colour  go. 

"  Yes ! "  she  snapped.  "  Them  girls  't  used  to  be 't 
the  St.  Albans,  't  you  thought  so  wonderful ! " 


422  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

"  I  didn't  know  I  thought  they  were  very 
wonderful ! " 

"Can't  you  answer  a  civil  question?"  she 
demanded,  raising  her  voice. 

"  I  haven't  heard  any,"  said  Lemuel,  with  sullen 
scorn. 

"  Oh  !  Well !  "  she  sneered.  "  I  forgot  that 
you  've  b'en  used  to  goin'  with  such  fine  folks  that 
you  can't  bear  to  be  spoken  to  in  plain  English." 

"  'Manda ! "  began  Statira,  with  an  incipient 
whimper. 

"  You  be  still,  S'tira  Dudley  !  Mr.  Barker,"  said 
the  poor  foolish  thing  in  the  mincing  falsetto  which 
she  thought  so  cutting,  "have  you  any  idea  what 's 
become  of  your  young  lady  artist  friends, — them  that 
took  your  portrait  as  a  Roman  youth,  you  know  1 " 

Lemuel  made  no  answer  whatever  for  a  time. 
Then,  whether  he  judged  it  best  to  do  so,  or  was 
goaded  to  the  defiance  by  'Manda  Grier's  manner,  he 
replied,  "  Miss  Swan  and  Miss  Carver  ?  Miss  Swan  is 
married,  and  lives  inWyomingTerritorynow."  Before 
he  had  reached  the  close  of  the  sentence  he  had  con 
trolled  himself  sufficiently  to  be  speaking  quite  calmly. 

"  Oh  indeed,  Mr.  Barker  !  And  may  I  ask  where 
Miss  Carver  is1?  She  merried  and  living  in  Wy 
oming  Territory  too  ] " 

"No,"  said  Lemuel  quietly.  "  She  's  not  married. 
She  's  in  Boston," 

"  Indeed  !  Then  it  was  her  I  see  in  the  Garden 
to-day,  S'tira  !  She  b'en  back  long,  Mr.  Barker  ? " 

"About  a  month,  I  think,"  said  Lemuel. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  423 

"  Quite  a  spell !     You  seen  her,  Mr.  Barker  1 " 

"Yes,  quite  often." 

"  I  want  to  know  !  She  still  paintin'  Roman  boys, 
Mr.  Barker  ?  Didn't  seem  to  make  any  great  out  at 
it  last  winter !  But  practice  makes  perfect,  they 
say.  I  s'pose  you  seen  her  in  the  Garden,  too  ? " 

"  I  usually  see  her  at  home,"  said  Lemuel.  "  You 
probably  receive  your  friends  on  the  benches  in 
the  Garden,  but  young  ladies  prefer  to  have  them 
call  at  their  residences."  He  astonished  himself  by 
this  brutality,  he  who  was  all  gentleness  with  Miss 
Carver. 

"Very  well,  Mr.  Barker!  That's  all  right. 
That 's  all  I  wanted  to  know.  Never  mind  about 
where  I  meet  my  friends.  Wherever  it  is,  they  're 
gentlemen  ;  and  they  ain't  generally  goin'  with  three 
or  four  girls  't  the  same  time." 

"No,  one  like  you  would  be  enough,"  retorted 
Lemuel. 

Statira  sat  cowering  away  from  the  quarrel,  and 
making  little  ineffectual  starts  as  if  to  stay  it. 
Heretofore  their  enmity  had  been  covert,  if  not  tacit, 
in  her  presence. 

Lemuel  saw  ner  wavering,  and  the  wish  to  show 
'Manda  his  superior  power  triumphed  over  every 
other  interest  and  impulse  in  him.  He  got  upon 
his  feet.  "There  is  no  use  in  this  sort  of  thing 
going  on  any  longer.  I  came  here  because  I  thought 
I  was  wanted.  If  it 's  a  mistake,  it 's  easy  enough  to 
mend  it,  and  it 's  easy  not  to  make  it  again.  I  wish 
you  good  evening." 


424  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

Statira  sprang  from  the  lounge,  and  flung  her 
arms  around  his  neck.  "  No,  no  !  You  sha'n't 
go  !  You  mustn't  go,  Lem  !  I  know  your  all  right, 
and  I  won't  have  you  talked  to  so  !  I  ain't  a  bit 
jealous/ Lem  ;  indeed  I  ain't.  I  know  you  wouldn't 
fool  with  me,  any  more  than  I  would  with  you  ;  and 
that 's  what  I  tell  'Man da  Grier,  I  '11  leave  it  to  her 
if  I  don't.  I  don't  care  who  you  go  with,  and  I 
hain't,  never  since  that  first  time.  I  know  you  ain't 
goin'  to  do  anything  underhanded.  Don't  go,  Lem  ; 
oh,  don't  go  !  " 

He  was  pulling  towards  the  door ;  her  trust,  her 
fond  generosity  drove  him  more  than  'Manda  Grier's 
cutting  tongue  :  that  hurt  his  pride,  his  vanity,  but 
this  pierced  his  soul ;  he  had  only  a  blind,  stupid 
will  to  escape  from  it. 

Statira  was  crying ;  she  began  to  cough ;  she 
released  his  neck  from  her  clasp,  and  reeled  back 
ward  to  the  lounge,  where  she  would  have  fallen,  if 
'Manda  Grier  had  not  caught  her.  The  paroxysm 
grew  more  violent ;  a  bright  stream  of  blood  sprang 
from  her  lips. 

"  Run  !  Run  for  the  doctor  !  Quick,  Lemuel ! 
Oh,  quick ! "  implored  'Manda  Grier,  forgetting  all 
enmity  in  her  terror. 

Statira's  arms  wavered  towards  him,  as  if  to  keep 
him,  but  he  turned  and  ran  from  the  house,  cowed 
and  conscience-stricken  by  the  sight  of  that  blood, 
as  if  he  had  shed  it. 

He  did  not  expect  to  see  Statira  alive  when  he 
came  back  with  the  doctor  whom  he  found  at  the 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  425 

next  apothecary's.  She  was  lying  on  the  lounge, 
white  as  death,  but  breathing  quietly,  and  her  eyes 
sought  him  with  an  eagerness  that  turned  to  a  look 
of  tender  gratitude  at  the  look  they  found  in  his. 

The  doctor  bent  over  her  for  her  pulse  and  her 
respiration ;  then  when  he  turned  to  examine  the 
crimson  handkerchief  which  'Manda  Grier  showed 
him,  Lemuel  dropped  on  his  knees  beside  her  and 
put  his  face  down  to  hers. 

With  her  lips  against  his  cheek  she  made,  "  Don't 
go!" 

And  he  whispered,  "  No,  I  '11  not  leave  you  now  !" 

The  doctor  looked  round  with  the  handkerchief 
still  in  his  hand,  as  if  doubting  whether  to  order 
him  away  from  her.  Then  he  mutely  questioned 
'Manda  Grier  with  a  glance  which  her  glance 
answered.  He  shrugged  his  shoulders,  with  a 
puzzled  sigh.  An  expression  of  pity  crossed  his 
face  which  he  hardened  into  one  of  purely  pro 
fessional  interest,  and  he  went  on  questioning 
'Manda  Grier  in  a  low  tone. 

Statira  had  slipped  her  hand  into  Lemuel's,  and 
she  held  it  fast,  as  if  in  that  clasp  she  were  holding 
on  to  her  chance  of  life. 


XXXII. 

SEWELL  returned  to  town  for  the  last  time  in  the 
third  week  of  September,  bringing  his  family  with 
him. 

This  was  before  the  greater  part  of  his  oddly 
assorted  congregation  had  thought  of  leaving  the 
country,  either  the  rich  cottagers  whose  family 
tradition  or  liberal  opinions  kept  them  in  his  church, 
or  the  boarding  and  camping  elements  who  were 
uniting  a  love  of  cheapness  with  a  love  of  nature  in 
their  prolonged  sojourn  among  the  woods  and  fields. 
Certain  families,  perhaps  half  of  his  parish  in  all, 
were  returning  because  the  schools  were  opening, 
and  they  must  put  their  children  into  them ;  and  it 
was  both  to  minister  to  the  spiritual  needs  of  these 
and  to  get  his  own  children  back  to  their  studies 
that  the  minister  was  at  home  so  early. 

It  was,  as  I  have  hinted  already,  a  difficult  and 
laborious  season  with  him ;  he  himself  was  always 
a  little  rusty  in  his  vocation  after  his  summer's  out 
ing,  and  felt  weakened  rather  than  strengthened  by 
his  rest.  The  domestic  machine  started  reluctantly  ; 
there  was  a  new  cook  to  be  got  in,  and  Mrs.  Sewell 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  427 

had  to  fight  a  battle  with  herself,  in  which  she 
invited  him  to  share,  before  she  could  settle  clown 
for  the  winter  to  the  cares  of  housekeeping.  The 
wide  skies,  the  dim  mountain  slopes,  the  long, 
delicious  drives,  the  fresh  mornings,  the  sweet, 
silvery  afternoons  of  their  idle  country  life,  haunted 
their  nerves  and  enfeebled  their  wills. 

One  evening  in  the  first  days  of  this  moral 
disability,  while  Sewell  sat  at  his  desk  trying  to  get 
himself  together  for  a  sermon,  Barker's  name  was 
brought  up  to  him. 

"Really,"  said  his  wife,  who  had  transmitted  it 
from  the  maid,  "  I  think  it 's  time  you  protected 
yourself,  David.  You  can't  let  this  go  on  for  ever. 
He  has  been  in  Boston  nearly  two  years  noAv ;  he 
has  regular  employment,  where  if  there  's  anything 
in  him  at  all,  he  ought  to  prosper  and  improve  with 
out  coming  to  you  every  other  night.  What  can  he 
want  now  1  " 

"I'm  sure  I  don't  know,"  said  the  minister, 
leaning  back  in  his  chair,  and  passing  his  hand 
wearily  over  his  forehead. 

"Then  send  down  and  excuse  yourself.  Tell 
him  you  're  busy,  and  ask  him  to  come  another 
time  !  " 

"  Ah,  you  know  I  can't  do  that,  my  dear." 

"Very  well,  then;  I  will  go  down  and  see  him. 
You  sha'n't  be  interrupted." 

"  Would  you,  my  dear  1  That  would  be  very 
kind  of  you !  Do  get  me  off  some  way ;  tell  him 
I'm  coming  to  see  him  very  soon."  He  went 


428  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

stupidly  back  to  his  writing,  without  looking  to  see 
whether  his  wife  had  meant  all  she  said ;  and  after 
a  moment's  hesitation  she  descended  in  fulfilment 
of  her  promise ;  or,  perhaps  rather  it  was  a 
threat. 

She  met  Lemuel  not  unkindly,  for  she  was  a  kind- 
hearted  woman ;  but  she  placed  duty  before  charity 
even,  and  she  could  not  help  making  him  feel  that 
she  was  there  in  the  discharge  of  a  duty.  She 
explained  that  Mr.  Sewell  was  very  unusually  busy 
that  evening,  and  had  sent  her  in  his  place,  and 
hoped  soon  to  see  him.  She  bade  Lemuel  sit  down, 
and  he  obeyed,  answering  all  the  questions  as  to 
the  summer  and  his  occupations  and  health,  and  his 
mother's  health,  which  she  put  to  him  in  proof  of 
her  interest  in  him ;  in  further  evidence  of  it,  she 
gave  him  an  account  of  the  Sewell  family's  doings 
since  they  last  met.  He  did  not  stay  long,  and  she 
returned  slowly  and  pensively  to  her  husband. 

"  Well  1 "  he  asked,  without  looking  round. 

"  Well ;  it 's  all  right,"  she  answered,  with  rather 
a  deep  breath.  "  He  didn't  seem  to  have  come 
for  anything  in  particular;  I  told  him  that  if  he 
wished  specially  to  speak  with  you,  you  would 
come  down." 

Sewell  went  on  with  his  writing,  and  after  a 
moment  his  wife  said,  "  But  you  must  go  and  see 
him  very  soon,  David ;  you  must  go  to-morrow." 

"Why]" 

"He  looks  wretchedly,  though  he  says  he's  very 
well  It  made  my  heart  ache.  He  looks  perfectly 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     429 

wan  and  haggard.  I  wish,"  she  burst  out,  "  I  wish 
I  had  let  you  go  down  and  see  him  ! " 

"  Why — why,  what  was  the  matter  1 "  asked 
Sewell,  turning  about  now.  "Did  you  think  he 
had  something  on  his  mind  1 " 

"  No,  but  he  looked  fairly  sick.  Oh,  I  wish  he 
had  never  come  into  our  lives  ! " 

"I'm  afraid  he  hasn't  got  much  good  from  us," 
sighed  the  minister.  "But  I'll  go  round  and  look 
him  up  in  the  morning.  His  trouble  will  keep  over 
night,  if  it 's  a  real  trouble.  There  's  that  comfort, 
at  least.  And  now,  do  go  away,  my  dear,  and  leave 
me  to  my  writing." 

Mrs.  Sewell  looked  at  him,  but  turned  and  left 
him,  apparently  reserving  whatever  sermon  she 
might  have  in  her  mind  till  he  should  have  finished 
his. 

The  next  morning  he  went  to  inquire  for  Lemuel 
at  Mr.  Corey's.  The  man  was  sending  him  away 
from  the  door  with  the  fact  merely  that  Lemuel  was 
not  then  in  the  house,  when  the  voice  of  Mr.  Corey 
descending  the  stairs  called  from  within :  "  Is  that 
you,  Sewell  ?  Don't  go  away  !  Come  in  !  " 

The  old  gentleman  took  him  into  the  library  and 
confessed  in  a  bit  of  new  slang,  which  he  said  was 
delightful,  that  he  was  all  balled  up  by  Lemuel's 
leaving  him,  and  asked  Sewell  what  he  supposed  it 
meant. 

"  Left  you  "?     Meant  1 "  echoed  Sewell. 

When  they  got  at  each  other  it  was  understood 
that  Lemuel,  the  day  before,  had  given  up  his 


430  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

employment  with  Mr.  Corey,  expressing  a  fit 
sense  of  all  his  kindness  and  a  fit  regret  at  leaving 
him,  but  alleging  no  reasons  for  his  course ;  and 
that  this  was  the  first  that  Sewell  knew  of  the 
affair. 

"  It  must  have  been  that  which  he  came  to  see  me 
about  last  night,"  he  said,  with  a  sort  of  anticipative 
remorse.  "  Mrs.  Sewell  saw  him — I  was  busy." 

"  Well !  Get  him  to  come  back,  Sewell,"  said 
Mr.  Corey,  with  his  whimsical  imperiousness ;  "  I 
can't  get  on  without  him.  All  my  moral  and 
intellectual  being  has  stopped  like  a  watch." 

Sewell  went  to  the  boarding-house  where  Lemuel 
took  his  meals,  but  found  that  he  no  longer  came 
there,  and  had  left  no  other  address.  He  knew 
nowhere  else  to  ask,  and  he  went  home  to  a  day  of 
latent  trouble  of  mind,  which  whenever  it  came  to 
the  light  defined  itself  as  helpless  question  and  self- 
reproach  in  regard  to  Barker. 

That  evening  as  he  sat  at  tea,  the  maid  came  with 
the  announcement  that  there  was  a  person  in  the 
reception-room  who  would  not  send  in  any  name, 
but  wished  to  see  Mr.  Sewell,  and  would  wait. 

Sewell  threw  down  his  napkin,  and  said,  'I'll 
bring  him  in  to  tea." 

Mrs.  Sewell  did  not  resist ;  she  bade  the  girl  lay 
another  plate. 

Sewell  was  so  sure  of  finding  Lemuel  in  the 
reception-room,  that  he  recoiled  in  dismay  from  the 
girlish  figure  that  turned  timidly  from  the  window 
to  meet  him  with  a  face  thickly  veiled.  He  was 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  43 1 

vexed,  too ;  here,  he  knew  from  the  mystery  put  on, 
was  one  of  those  cases  of  feminine  trouble,  real  or 
unreal,  which  he  most  disliked  to  meddle  with. 

"  Will  you  sit  down  1 "  he  said,  as  kindly  as  he 
could,  and  the  girl  obeyed. 

"I  thought  they  would  let  me  wait.  I  didn't 
mean  to  interrupt  you,"  she  began,  in  a  voice 
singularly  gentle  and  unaffected. 

"  Oh,  no  matter  !  "  cried  Sewell.  "  I  'm  very  glad 
to  see  you." 

"  I  thought  you  could  help  me.  I  'm  in  great 
trouble — doubt " 

The  voice  was  almost  childlike  in  its  appealing 
innocence. 

Sewell  sat  down  opposite  the  girl  and  bent 
sympathetically  forward.  "  Well  1 " 

She  waited  a  moment.  Then,  "I  don't  know 
how  to  begin,"  she  said  hoarsely,  and  stopped 
again. 

Sewell  was  touched.  He  forgot  Lemuel ;  he  for 
got  everything  but  the  heartache  which  he  divined 
before  him,  and  his  Christ-derived  office,  his  holy 
privilege,  of  helping  any  in  want  of  comfort  or 
guidance.  "  Perhaps,"  he  said,  in  his  loveliest  way, 
— the  way  that  had  won  his  wife's  heart,  and  that 
still  provoked  her  severest  criticism  for  its  insincer 
ity;  it  was  so  purely  impersonal, — "perhaps  that 
isn't  necessary,  if  you  mean  beginning  at  the  begin 
ning.  If  you  Ve  any  trouble  that  you  think  I  cnn 
advise  you  in,  perhaps  it's  better  for  both  of  us  that 
I  shouldn't  know  very  much  of  it." 


432  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

"Yes  1"  murmured  the  girl  questioningly. 

"  I  mean  that  if  you  tell  me  much,  you  will  go 
away  feeling  that  you  have  somehow  parted  with 
yourself,  that  you  're  no  longer  in  your  own  keeping, 
but  in  mine ;  and  you  know  that  in  everything  our 
help  must  really  come  from  within  our  own  free 
consciences." 

"  Yes,"  said  the  girl  again,  from  behind  the  veil 
which  completely  hid  her  face.  She  now  hesitated 
a  long  time.  She  put  her  handkerchief  under  her 
veil ;  and  at  last  she  said  :  "I  know  what  you 
mean."  Her  voice  quivered  pathetically  ;  she  tried 
to  control  it.  "  Perhaps,"  she  whispered  huskily, 
after  another  interval,  "  I  can  put  it  in  the  form  of 
a  question." 

"  That  would  be  best,"  said  Sewell. 

She  hesitated ;  the  tears  fell  down  upon  her  hands 
behind  her  veil ;  she  no  longer  wiped  them.  "  It 's 
because  I  Ve  often — heard  you ;  because  I  know  you 
will  tell  me  what  Js  true  and  right " 

"Your  own  heart  must  do  that,"  said  the  minis 
ter,  "  but  I  will  gladly  help  you  all  I  can." 

She  did  not  heed  him  now,  but  continued  as  if 
rapt  quite  away  from  him. 

"If  there  was  some  one — something — if  there  was 
something  that  it  would  be  right  for  you  to  do — to 
have,  if  there  was  no  one  else;  but  if  there  were 

some  else  that  had  a  right  first "  She  broke  off 

and  asked  abruptly,  "  Don't  you  think  it  is  always 
right  to  prefer  another — the  interest  of  another  to 
your  own  ? " 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     433 

Sewell  could  not  help  smiling.  "There  is  only 
one  thing  for  us  to  do  when  we  are  in  any  doubt  or 
perplexity,"  he  said  cheerily,  "  and  that  is  the  un 
selfish  thing." 

"  Yes,"  she  gasped  ;  she  seemed  to  be  speaking  to 
herself.  "  I  saw  it,  I  knew  it  !  Even  if  it  kills  us, 
AVC  must  do  it !  Nothing  ought  to  weigh  against  it! 
Oh,  I  thank  you  ! " 

Sewell  was  puzzled.  He  felt  dimly  that  she  was 
thanking  him  for  anguish  and  despair.  "  I  'm  afraid 
that  I  don't  quite  understand  you." 

"  I  thought  I  told  you,"  she  answered,  with  a 
certain  reproach,  and  a  fall  of  courage  in  view  of  the 
fresh  effort  she  must  make.  It  was  some  moments 
before  she  could  say,  "  If  you  knew  that  some  one 
— some  one  who  was — everything  to  you — and  that 
you  knew — believed 

At  fifty  it  is  hard  to  be  serious  about  these  things, 
and  it  was  well  for  the  girl  that  she  was  no  longer 
conscious  of  Sewell's  mood. 

" Cared  for  you  ;  and  if  you  knew  that  before 

he  had  cared  for  you  there  had  been  some  else — 
some  else  that  he  was  as  much  to  as  he  was  to  you, 
and  that  couldn't  give  him  up,  what — should 
you " 

Sewell  fetched  a  long  sigh  of  relief ;  he  had  been 
afraid  of  a  much  darker  problem  than  this.  He 
almost  smiled. 

"  My  dear  child," — she  seemed  but  a  child  there 
before  the  mature  man  with  her  poor  little  love- 
trouble,  so  intricate  and  hopeless  to  her,  so  simple 
2E 


434  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

and  easy  to  him— "that  depends  upon  a  great  many 
circumstances." 

He  could  feel  through  her  veil  the  surprise  with 
which  she  turned  to  him  :  "  You  said,  whenever  we 
are  in  doubt,  we  must  act  unselfishly." 

"Yes,  I  said  that.  But  you  must  first  be  sure 
what  is  really  selfish " 

"  I  know  what  is  selfish  in  this  case,"  said  the  girl 
with  a  sublimity  which,  if  foolish,  was  still  sublimity. 

"  She  is  sick— it  will  kill  her  to  lose  him You 

have  said  what  I  expected,  and  I  thank  you,  thank 
you,  thank  you  !  And  I  will  do  it !  Oh,  don't  fear 
now  but  I  shall ;  I  have  done  it !  No  matter,"  she 
went  on  in  her  exaltation,  "no  matter  how  much  we 
care  for  each  other,  now  !  " 

"No,"  said  Sewell  decidedly.  "That  doesn't 
follow.  I  have  thought  of  such  things ;  there  was 
such  a  case  within  my  experience  once," — he  could 
not  help  alleging  this  case,  in  which  he  had  long 
triumphed,— "  and  I  have  always  felt  that  I  did 
right  in  advising  against  a  romantic  notion  of  self- 
sacrifice  in  such  matters.  You  may  commit  a 
greater  wrong  in  that  than  in  an  act  of  apparent 
self-interest.  You  have  not  put  the  case  fully 
before  me,  and  it  isn't  necessary  that  you  should, 
but  if  you  contemplate  any  rash  sacrifice,  I  warn 
you  against  it." 

"  You  said  that  we  ought  to  act  unselfishly." 

"  Yes,  but  you  must  beware  of  the  refined  selfish 
ness  which  shrinks  from  righteous  self-assertion 
because  it  is  painful.  You  must  make  sure  of  your 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     435 

real  motive ;  you  must  consider  whether  your 
sacrifice  is  not  going  to  do  more  harm  than  good. 
But  why  do  you  come  to  me  with  your  trouble  1 
Why  don't  you  go  to  your  father — your  mother  2  " 

"I  have  none." 

"Ah " 

She  had  risen  and  pushed  by  him  to  the  outer 
door,  though  he  tried  to  keep  her.  "Don't  be 
rash,"  he  urged.  "  I  advise  you  to  take  time  to 
think  of  this " 

She  did  not  answer ;  she  seemed  now  only  to  wish 
to  escape,  as  if  in  terror  of  him. 

She  pulled  open  the  door,  and  was  gone. 

Sewell  went  back  to  his  tea,  bewildered,  con 
founded. 

"  What 's  the  matter  1  Why  didn't  he  come  in  to 
tea  with  you  1 "  asked  his  wife. 

"  Who  ? " 

"  Barker." 

"  What  Barker  ?  " 

"  David,  what  is  the  matter  1 " 

Sewell  started  from  his  daze,  and  glanced  at  his 
children  :  "  I  '11  tell  you  by  and  by,  Lucy." 


XXXIII. 

A  MONTH  passed,  and  Sewell  heard  nothing  of 
Lemuel.  His  charge,  always  elusive  and  evanescent, 
had  now  completely  vanished,  and  he  could  find  no 
trace  of  him.  Mr.  Corey  suggested  advertising. 
Bellingham  said,  why  not  put  it  in  the  hands  of  a 
detective  1  He  said  he  had  never  helped  work  any 
thing  up  with  a  detective ;  he  rather  thought  he 
should  like  to  do  it.  Sewell  thought  of  writing 
to  Barker's  mother  at  Willoughby  Pastures,  but  he 
postponed  it ;  perhaps  it  would  alarm  her  if  Barker 
were  not  there ;  Sewell  had  many  other  cares  and 
duties  ;  Lemuel  became  more  and  more  a  good  in 
tention  of  the  indefinite  future.  After  all,  he  had 
always  shown  the  ability  to  take  care  of  himself,  and 
except  that  he  had  mysteriously  disappeared  there 
was  no  reason  for  anxiety  about  him. 

One  night  his  name  came  up  at  a  moment  when 
Sewell  was  least  prepared  by  interest  or  expectation 
to  see  him.  He  smiled  to  himself  in  running  down 
stairs,  at  the  reflection  that  he  never  seemed  quite 
ready  for  Barker.  But  it  was  a  relief  to  have  him 
turn  up  again  ;  there  was  no  question  of  that,  and 
Sewell  showed  him  a  face  of  welcome  that  dropped 

436 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     437 

at  sight  of  him.  He  scarcely  new  the  gaunt,  care 
worn  face  or  the  shabby  figure  before  him,  in  place 
of  the  handsome,  well-dressed  young  fellow  whom  he 
had  come  to  greet.  There  seemed  a  sort  of  rever 
sion  in  Barker's  whole  presence  to  the  time  when 
Sewell  first  found  him  in  that  room;  and  in  whatever 
trouble  he  now  was,  the  effect  was  that  of  his 
original  rustic  constraint. 

Trouble  there  was  of  some  kind,  Sewell  could  see 
at  a  glance,  and  his  kind  heart  prompted  him  to  take 
Lemuel's  hand  between  both  of  his.  "Why,  my 
dear  boy ! "  he  began ;  but  he  stopped  and  made 
Lemuel  sit  down,  waited  for  him  to  speak,  without 
further  question  or  comment. 

"  Mr.  Sewell,"  the  young  man  said  abruptly,  "  you 
told  me  once  you — that  you  sometimes  had  money 
put  into  your  hands  that  you  could  lend." 

"  Yes,"  replied  Sewell,  with  eager  cordiality. 

"  Could  I  borrow  about  seventy-five  dollars  of 
you  1 " 

"  Why,  certainly,  Barker  ! "  Sewell  had  not  so 
much  of  what  he  called  his  flying-charity  fund 
by  him,  but  he  instantly  resolved  to  advance  the 
difference  out  of  his  own  pocket. 

"  It 's  to  get  me  an  outfit  for  horse-car  conductor," 
said  Lemuel.  "  I  can  have  the  place  if  I  can  get  the 
outfit." 

"  Horse-car  conductor  ! "  reverberated  Sewell. 
"  What  in  the  world  for  ?  " 

"  It 's  work  I  can  do,"  answered  Lemuel  briefly, 
but  not  resentfully. 


438  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE;  OR, 

"But  there  are  so  many  other  things — better — 
fitter — more  profitable  !  Why  did  you  leave  Mr. 
Corey  1  I  assure  you  that  you  have  been  a  great 
loss  to  him — in  every  way.  You  don't  know  how 
much  he  valued  you,  personally.  He  will  be  only 
too  glad  to  have  you  come  back." 

"  I  can't  go  back,"  said  Lemuel.  "I  'm  going  to 
get  married." 

"  Married  ! "  cried  Sewell  in  consternation. 

"My — the  lady  that  I'm  going  to  marry — has 
been  sick,  ever  since  the  first  of  October,  and  I 
haven't  had  a  chance  to  look  up  any  kind  of  work. 
But  she 's  better  now  ;  and  I  've  heard  of  this  place 
I  can  get.  I  don't  like  to  trouble  you ;  but — every 
thing  's  gone — I  've  got  my  mother  down  here  help 
ing  take  care  of  her ;  and  I  must  do  something.  I 
don't  know  just  when  I  can  pay  you  back  ;  but  1 11 
do  it  sometime." 

"  Oh,  I  'm  sure  of  that,"  said  Sewell,  from  the 
abyss  of  hopeless  conjecture  into  which  these  facts 
had  plunged  him;  his  wandering  fancy  was  domi 
nated  by  the  presence  of  Lemuel's  mother  with  her 
bloomers  in  Boston.  "I — I  hope  there's  nothing 
serious  the  trouble  with  your — the  lady  1  "  he  said, 
rubbing  away  with  his  hand  the  smile  that  came  to 
his  lips  in  spite  of  him. 

"  It 's  lung  trouble,"  said  Lemuel  quietly. 

"  Oh  !"  responded  Sewell.  "Well!  Well!"  He 
shook  himself  together,  and  wondered  what  had 
become  of  the  impulse  he  had  felt  to  scold  Barker 
for  the  idea  of  getting  married.  But  such  a  course 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  439 

now  seemed  not  only  far  beyond  his  province, — he 
heard  himself  saying  that  to  Mrs.  Sewell  in  self- 
defence  when  she  should  censure  him  for  not  doing 
it, — but  utterly  useless  in  view  of  the  further 
complications.  "  Well  1  This  is  great  news  you 
tell  me — a  great  surprise.  You  're — you  're  going  to 

take    an    important  step You — you- Of 

course,  of  course  !  You  must  have  a  great  many 
demands  upon  you,  under  the  circumstances.  Yes, 
yes  !  And  I  'm  very  glad  you  came  to  me.  If  your 
mind  is  quite  made  up  about " 

"  Yes,  I  've  thought  it  over,"  said  Lemuel.  "  The 
lady  has  had  to  work  all  her  life,  and  she — she  isn't 
used  to  what  I  thought-— what  I  intended — any 
other  kind  of  people ;  and  it 's  better  for  us  both 
that  I  should  get  some  kind  of  work  that  won't 

take    me    away   from    her    too    much "      He 

dropped  his  head,  and  Sewell  with  a  flash  of  intelli 
gence  felt  a  thrill  of  compassionate  admiration  for 
the  poor,  foolish,  generous  creature,  for  so  Lemuel 
complexly  appeared  to  him. 

Again  he  forbore  question  or  comment. 

"  Well — well  !  we  must  look  you  up,  Mrs.  Sewell 
and  I.  We  must  come  to  see  your — the  lady."  He 
found  himself  falling  helplessly  into  Lemuel's  way 
of  describing  her.  "Just  write  me  your  address 
here," — he  put  a  scrap  of  paper  before  Lemuel  on 
the  davenport, — "and  I'll  go  and  get  you  the 
money." 

He  brought  it  back  in  an  envelope  which  held  a 
very  little  more  than  Lemuel  had  asked  for — Sewell 


440  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE. 

had  not  dared  to  add  much — and  Lemuel  put  it  in 
his  pocket. 

He  tried  to  say  something ;  he  could  only  make  a 
husky  noise  in  his  throat. 

"  Good  night ! "  said  Sewell  pressing  his  hand 
with  both  of  his  again,  at  the  door.  "We  shall 
come  very  soon." 

"  MARRIED  !  "  said  Mrs.  Sewell,  when  he  returned 
to  her;  and  then  she  suffered  a  silence  to  ensue, 
in  which  it  seemed  to  Sewell  that  his  inculpation 
was  visibly  accumulating  mountains  vast  and  high. 
"  Wlud  did  you  say  ?  " 

"Nothing,"  he  answered  almost  gaily;  the  case 
was  so  far  beyond  despair.  "What  should  you 
have  said  ?" 


XXXIV. 

LEMUEL  got  a  conductor's  overcoat  and  cap  at  half- 
price  from  a  man  who  had  been  discharged,  and  put 
by  the  money  saved  to  return  to  Sewell  when  he 
should  come.  He  entered  upon  his  duties  the  next 
morning,  under  the  instruction  of  an  old  conductor, 
who  said,  "  Hain't  I  seen  you  som'ere's  before  ?  "  and 
he  worked  all  day,  taking  money  and  tickets, 
registering  fares,  helping  ladies  on  and  off  the  car, 
and  monotonously  journeying  back  and  forth  over  his 
route.  He  went  on  duty  at  six  o'clock  in  the  morning, 
after  an  early  breakfast  that  'Manda  Grier  and  his 
mother  got  him,  for  Statira  was  not  strong  enough 
yet  to  do  much,  and  he  was  to  be  relieved  at  eight. 
At  nightfall,  after  two  half-hour  respites  for  dinner 
and  tea,  he  was  so  tired  that  he  could  scarcely  stand. 

"  Well,  how  do  you  like  it,  as  fur 's  you  've  gone  1 " 
asked  the  instructing  conductor,  in  whom  Lemuel 
had  recognised  an  old  acquaintance.  "  Sweet  life, 
ain't  it  ?  There  !  That  switch  hain't  worked  again  ! 
Jump  off,  young  man,  and  put  your  shoulder  to  the 
wheel !  " 

The  car  had  failed  to  take  the  right-hand  turn 

441 


442  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

where  the  line  divided ;  it  had  to  be  pushed  back, 
and  while  the  driver  tugged  and  swore  under  his 
breath  at  his  horses,  Lemuel  set  himself  to  push  the 
car. 

"  'S  no  use  ! "  said  the  driver  finally.  "  I  got  to 
hitch  'em  on  at  the  other  end,  and  pull  her  back." 

He  uncoupled  the  team  from  the  front  of  the  car, 
and  swung  round  with  it.  Lemuel  felt  something 
strike  him  on  the  leg,  and  he  fell  down.  He  scram 
bled  to  his  feet  again,  but  his  left  leg  doubled  under 
him  ;  it  went  through  his  mind  that  one  of  the  horses 
must  have  lashed  out  and  broken  it ;  then  everything 
seemed  to  stop. 

The  world  began  again  for  him  in  the  apothecary's 
shop  where  he  had  been  carried,  and  from  which  he 
was  put  into  an  ambulance,  by  a  policeman.  It 
stopped  again,  as  he  whirled  away ;  it  renewed  itself 
in  anguish,  and  ceased  in  bliss  as  he  fainted  from  the 
pain  or  came  to. 

They  lifted  him  up  some  steps,  at  last,  and  carried 
him  into  a  high,  bright  room,  where  there  were 
two  or  three  cots,  and  a  long  glass  case  full  of 
surgical  instruments.  They  laid  him  on  a  cot,  and 
some  one  swiftly  and  skilfully  undressed  him.  A 
surgeon  had  come  in,  and  now  he  examined  Lemuel's 
leg.  He  looked  once  or  twice  at  his  face. 

"  This  is  a  pretty  bad  job,  I  can't  tell  how  bad  till 
you  have  had  the  ether.  Will  you  leave  it  with  me  ?  " 

"Yes.     But  do  the  best  you  can  for  me." 

"You  may  be  sure  I  will." 

Lemuel  believed  that  they  meant  to  cut  off  his  leg. 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  443 

He  knew  that  he  had  a  right  to  refuse  and  to  take 
the  consequences,  but  he  would  not ;  he  had  no  right 
to  choose  death,  when  he  had  others  to  live  for. 

He  woke  deathly  sick  at  first,  and  found  himself 
lying  in  bed,  one  of  the  two  rows  in  a  long  room, 
where  there  were  some  quiet  women  in  neat  caps 
and  seersucker  dresses  going  about,  with  bowls  of 
food  and  bottles  of  medicine. 

Lemuel  still  felt  his  leg,  and  the  pain  in  it,  but  he 
had  heard  how  mutilated  men  felt  their  lost  limbs  all 
their  lives,  and  he  was  afraid  to  make  sure  by  the 
touch  of  his  hand. 

A  nurse  who  saw  his  eyes  open  came  to  him.  He 
turned  them  upon  her,  but  he  could  not  speak.  She 
must  have  understood.  "The  doctor  thinks  he  can 
save  your  leg  for  you  ;  but  it 's  a  bad  fracture.  You 
must  be  careful  to  keep  very  still." 

He  fell  asleep ;  and  life  began  again  for  him, 
in  the  midst  of  suffering  and  death.  He  saw  every 
day  broken  and  mangled  men,  drunk  with  ether, 
brought  up  as  he  had  been,  and  laid  in  beds  ;  he  saw 
the  priest  of  the  religion  to  which  most  of  the  poor 
and  lowly  still  belong,  go  and  come  among  the  cots, 
and  stand  by  the  pillows  where  the  sick  feebly 
followed  him  in  the  mystical  gestures  which  he  made 
on  his  brow  and  breast ;  he  learned  to  know  the  use 
of  the  white  linen  screen  which  was  drawn  about  a 
bed  to  hide  the  passing  of  a  soul ;  he  became  familiar 
with  the  helpless  sympathy,  the  despair  of  the  friends 
who  came  to  visit  the  sick  and  dying. 

He  had  not  lacked  for  more  attention  and  interest 


444  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

from  his  own  than  the  rules  of  the  hospital  allowed. 
His  mother  and  'Manda  Grier  came  first,  and  then 
Statira  when  they  would  let  her.  She  thought  it 
hard  that  she  was  not  suffered  to  do  the  least  thing 
for  him ;  she  wished  to  take  him  away  to  their  own 
rooms,  where  she  could  nurse  him  twice  as  well.  At 
first  she  cried  whenever  she  saw  him,  and  lamented 
over  him,  so  that  the  head  nurse  was  obliged  to 
explain  to  her  that  she  disturbed  the  patients, 
and  could  not  come  any  more  unless  she  controlled 
herself.  She  promised,  and  kept  her  word ;  she 
sat  quietly  by  his  pillow  and  held  his  hand,  when  she 
came,  except  when  she  put  up  her  own  to  hide  the 
cough  which  she  could  not  always  restrain.  The 
nurse  told  her  that,  of  course,  she  was  not  accountable 
for  the  cough,  but  she  had  better  try  to  check  it. 
Statira  brought  troches  with  her,  and  held  them  in 
her  mouth  for  this  purpose. 

Lemuel's  family  was  taken  care  of  in  this  time  of 
disaster.  The  newspapers  had  made  his  accident 
promptly  known  ;  and  not  only  Sewell,  but  Miss  Vane 
and  Mrs.  Corey  had  come  to  see  if  they  could  be  of 
any  use. 

One  day  a  young  girl  brought  a  bouquet  of  flowers 
and  set  it  by  Lemuel's  bed,  when  he  seemed  asleep. 
He  suddenly  opened  his  eyes,  and  saw  Sybil  Vane  for 
the  first  time  since  their  quarrel. 

She  put  her  finger  to  her  lip,  and  smiled  with  the 
air  of  a  lady  benefactress ;  then,  with  a  few  words  of 
official  sympathy,  she  encouraged  him  to  get  well, 
and  flitted  to  the  next  bed,  where  she  bestowed 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  445 

a  jacqueminot   rosebud   on   a   Chinaman   dying  of 
cancer. 

Sewell  came  often  to  see  him,  at  first  in  the  teeth 
of  his  mother's  obvious  hostility,  but  with  her  greater 
and  greater  relenting.  Nothing  seemed  gloomier 
than  the  outlook  for  Lemuel,  but  Sewell  had  lived 
too  long  not  to  know  that  the  gloom  of  an  outlook 
has  nothing  to  do  with  a  man's  real  future.  It  was 
impossible,  of  course,  for  Lemuel  to  go  back  to  Mr. 
Corey's  now  with  a  sick  wife,  who  would  need  so 
much  of  his  care.  Besides,  he  did  not  think  it  desir 
able  on  other  accounts.  He  recurred  to  what  Lemuel 
had  said  about  getting  work  that  should  not  take 
him  too  far  away  from  the  kind  of  people  his 
betrothed  was  used  to,  and  he  felt  a  pity  and  respect 
for  the  boy  whom  life  had  already  taught  this  wis 
dom,  this  resignation.  He  could  see  that  before  his 
last  calamity  had  come  upon  him,  Barker  was  trying 
to  adjust  his  ambition  to  his  next  duty,  or  rather  to 
subordinate  it ;  and  the  conviction  that  he  was  right 
gave  Sewell  courage  to  think  that  he  would  yet  some 
how  succeed.  It  also  gave  him  courage  to  resist,  on 
Barker's  behalf,  the  generous  importunities  of  some 
who  would  have  befriended  him.  Mr.  Corey  and 
Charles  Bellingham  drove  up  to  the  hospital  one  day, 
to  see  Lemuel ;  and  when  Sewell  met  them  the  same 
evening,  they  were  full  of  enthusiasm.  Corey  said 
that  the  effect  of  the  hospital,  with  its  wards  branch 
ing  from  the  classistic  building  in  the  centre,  was 
delightfully  Italian  ;  it  \vas  like  St.  Peter's  on  a  small 
scale,  and  he  had  no  idea  how  interesting  the  South 


446  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

End  was ;  it  was  quite  a  bit  of  foreign  travel  to  go 
up  there.  Bellingham  had  explored  the  hospital 
throughout ;  he  said  he  had  found  it  the  thing  to  do — 
it  was  a  thing  for  everybody  to  do ;  he  was  astonished 
that  he  had  never  done  it  before.  They  united  in 
praising  Barker,  and  they  asked  what  could  be  done 
for  him.  Corey  was  strenuous  for  his  coming  back 
to  him ;  at  any  rate  they  must  find  something  for 
him.  Bellingham  favoured  the  notion  of  doing  some 
thing  for  his  education;  a  fellow  like  that  could 
come  to  almost  anything. 

Sewell  shook  his  head.  "All  that's  impossible, 
now.  With  that  girl " 

"  Oh,  confound  her  ! "  cried  Bellingham. 

"I  was  rather  disappointed  at  not  seeing  his 
mother,"  said  Corey.  "  I  had  counted  a  good  deal, 
I  find,  upon  Mrs.  Barker's  bloomers." 

"With  a  girl  like  that  for  his  wife,"  pursued 
Sewell,  "  the  conditions  are  all  changed.  He  must 
cleave  to  her  in  mind  as  well  as  body,  and  he  must 
seek  the  kind  of  life  that  will  unite  them  more  and 
more,  not  less  and  less.  In  fact,  he  was  instinctively 
doing  so  when  this  accident  happened.  That 's  what 
marriage  means." 

"  Oh,  not  always,"  suggested  Corey. 

"He  must  go  back  to  Willoughby  Pastures," 
Sewell  concluded,  "to  his  farm." 

"  Oh,  come  now  !  "  said  Bellingham,  with  disgust. 

"  If  that  sort  of  thing  is  to  go  on,"  said  Corey, 
"  what  is  to  become  of  the  ancestry  of  the  future  tlite 
of  Bston  ?  I  counted  upon  Barker  to  found  one  of 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     447 

our  first  families.  Besides,  any  Irishman  could  take 
his  farm  and  do  better  with  it.  The  farm  would  be 
meat  to  the  Irishman,  and  poison  to  Barker,  now  that 
he  Js  once  tasted  town." 

"  Yes,  I  know  all  that,"  said  Sewell  sadly.  "  I  once 
thought  the  greatest  possible  good  I  could  do  Barker, 
after  getting  him  to  Boston,  was  to  get  him  back  to 
Willoughby  Pastures  ;  but  if  that  was  ever  true,  the 
time  is  past.  Now,  it  merely  seems  the  only  thing 
possible.  When  he  gets  well,  he  will  still  have  an 
invalid  wife  on  his  hands ;  he  must  provide  her  a 
home ;  she  could  have  helped  him  once,  and  would 
have  done  so,  I  've  no  doubt ;  but  now  she  must  be 
taken  care  of." 

"Look  here!"  said  Bellingham.  "What's  the 
reason  these  things  can't  be  managed  as  they  are  in 
the  novels  ?  In  any  well-regulated  romance  that 
cough  of  hers  would  run  into  quick  consumption  and 
carry  Barker's  fiancee  off  in  six  weeks ;  and  then  he 
could  resume  his  career  of  usefulness  and  prosperity 
here,  don't  you  know.  He  could  marry  some  one 
else,  and  found  that  family  that  Corey  wants. 

They  all  laughed,  Sewell  ruefully. 

"As  it  is,"  said  Corey,  "I  suppose  she'll  go  on 
having  hemorrhages  to  a  good  old  age,  and  outlive 
him,  after  being  a  clog  and  burden  to  him  all  his  life. 
Poor  devil !  What  in  the  world  possesses  him  to  want 
to  marry  her  1  But  I  suppose  the  usual  thing." 

This  gave  Sewell  greater  discomfort  than  the 
question  of  Lemuel's  material  future.  He  said  list 
lessly,  "  Oh,  I  suppose  so,"  but  he  was  far  from 


448  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

thinking  precisely  that.  He  had  seen  Lemuel  and 
the  young  girl  together  a  great  deal,  and  a  painful 
misgiving  had  grown  up  in  his  mind.  It  seemed  to 
him  that  while  he  had  seen  no  want  of  patience  and 
kindness  towards  her  in  Lemuel,  he  had  not  seen  the 
return  of  her  fondness,  which,  silly  as  it  was  in  some 
of  its  manifestations,  he  thought  he  should  be  glad  of 
in  him.  Yet  he  was  not  sure.  Barker  was  always 
so  self-contained  that  he  might  very  well  feel  more 
love  for  her  than  he  showed ;  and,  after  all,  Sewell 
rather  weakly  asked  himself,  was  the  love  so  abso 
lutely  necessary  ? 

When  he  repeated  this  question  in  his  wife's 
presence,  she  told  him  she  was  astonished  at  him. 

"You  know  that  it  is  vitally  necessary  !  It's  all 
the  more  necessary,  if  he 's  so  superior  to  her,  as 
you  say.  I  can't  think  what's  become  of  your 
principles,  my  dear  ! " 

"  I  do,  you  've  got  them,"  said  Sewell. 

"I  really  believe  I  have,"  said  his  wife,  with  that 
full  conviction  of  righteousness  which  her  sex  alone 
can  feel.  "I  have  always  heard  you  say  that 
marriage  without  love  was  not  only  sinful  in  itself, 
but  the  beginning  of  sorrow.  Why  do  you  think 
now  that  it  makes  no  difference  1 " 

"I  suppose  I  was  trying  to  adapt  myself  to 
circumstances,"  answered  Sewell,  frankly  at  least. 
"  Let 's  hope  that  my  facts  are  as  wrong  as  my  con 
clusions.  I'm  not  sure  of  either.  I  suppose,  if  I 
saw  him  idolising  so  slight  and  light  a  person  as  she 
seems  to  be,  I  should  be  more  disheartened  about 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     449 

his  future  than  I  am  now.  If  he  overvalued  her,  it 
would  only  drag  him  lower  down." 

"  Oh,  his  future  !  Drag  him  down  !  Why  don't 
you  think  of  her,  going  up  there  to  that  dismal 
wilderness,  to  spend  her  days  in  toil  and  poverty, 
with  a  half-crazy  mother-in-law,  and  a  rheumatic 
brother-in-law,  in  such  a  looking  hovel  1 "  Mrs. 
Sewell  did  not  group  these  disadvantages  con 
ventionally,  but  they  were  effective.  "  You  have 
allowed  your  feelings  about  that  baffling  creature  to 
blind  you  to  everything  else,  David.  Why  should 
you  care  so  much  for  his  future,  and  nothing  for 
hers  ?  Is  that  so  very  bright  1 " 

"I  don't  think  that  either  is  dazzling,"  sighed  the 
minister.  Yet  Barker's  grew  a  little  lighter  as  he 
familiarised  himself  with  it,  or  rather  with  Barker. 
He  found  that  he  had  a  plan  for  getting  a  teacher's 
place  in  the  Academy,  if  they  reopened  it  at  Wil- 
loughby  Pastures,  as  they  talked  of  doing,  under 
the  impulse  of  such  a  course  in  one  of  the  neighbour 
ing  towns,  and  that  he  was  going  home,  in  fancy  at 
least,  with  purposes  of  enlightenment  and  elevation 
which  would  go  far  to  console  him  under  such 
measure  of  disappointment  as  they  must  bring. 
Sewell  hinted  to  Barker  that  he  must  not  be  too 
confident  of  remodelling  Willoughby  Pastures  upon 
the  pattern  of  Boston. 

"  Oh    no ;  I    don't    expect   that,"    said    Lemuel. 

"What    I    mean    is    that    I    shall    always    try    to 

remember  myself  what  I  've  learnt  here — from  the 

kind  of  men  I  've  seen,  and  the  things  that  I  know 

2F 


450  THE~MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

people  are  all  the  time  doing  for  others.  I  told  you 
once  that  they  haven't  got  any  idea  of  that  in  the 
country.  I  don't  expect  to  preach  it  into  them; 
they  wouldn't  like  it  if  I  did  ;  and  they  'd  make  fan 
of  it ;  but  if  I  could  try  to  live  it  ? " 

"Yes,"  said  Sewell,  touched  by  this,  young  en 
thusiasm. 

"  I  don't  know  as  I  can  all  the  time,"  said  Lemuel. 
"But  it  seems  to  me  that  that's  what  I've  learnt 
here,  if  I  Ve  learnt  anything.  I  think  the  world  's  a 
good  deal  better  than  I  used  to." 

"  Do  you  indeed,  my  dear  boy  ? "  asked  Sewell, 
greatly  interested.  "It's  a  pretty  well-meaning 
world — I  hope  it  is." 

"  Yes,  that 's  what  I  mean,"  said  Lemuel.  "  I 
presume  it  ain't  perfect — isn't,  I  should  say,"  and 
Sewell  smiled.  "  Mr.  Corey  was  always  correcting 
me  on  that.  But  if  I  were  to  do  nothing  but  pass 
along  the  good  that 's  been  clone  me  since  I  came 
here,  I  should  be  kept  busy  the  rest  of  my  life." 

Sewell  knew  that  this  emotion  was  largely  the 
physical  optimism  of  convalescence;  but  he  could 
not  refuse  the  comfort  it  gave  him  to  find  Barker  in 
such  a  mood,  and  he  did  not  conceive  it  his  duty  to 
discourage  it.  Lofty  ideals,  if  not  indulged  at  the 
expense  of  lowly  realities,  he  had  never  found 
hurtful  to  any ;  and  it  was  certainly  better  for 
Barker  to  think  too  well  than  too  ill  of  Boston,  if  it 
furnished  him  incentives  to  unselfish  living.  H^e 
could  think  of  enough  things  in  the  city  to 
warrant  a  different  judgment,  but  if  Barker's  lesson 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  451 

from  his  experience  there  was  this,  Sewell  was  not 
the  person  to  weaken  its  force  with  him.  He  said, 
with  a  smile  of  reserved  comment,  "  Well,  perhaps 
you'll  be  coming  back  to  us,  some  day." 

"I  don't  look  forward  to  that,"  said  Lemuel 
soberly  ;  and  then  his  face  took  a  sterner  cast,  as  if 
from  the  force  of  his  resolution.  "The  first  thing 
I  've  got  to  do  after  I  Ve  made  a  home  for  her  is  to 
get  Statira  away  from  the  town  where  she  can  have 
some  better  air,  and  see  if  she  can't  get  her  health 
back.  It  '11  be  time  enough  to  talk  of  Boston  again 
when  she  's  fit  to  live  here." 

The  minister's  sympathetic  spirit  sank  again.  But 
his  final  parting  with  Barker  was  not  unhopeful. 
Lemuel  consented  to  accept  from  him  a  small  loan, 
to  the  compass  of  which  he  reduced  the  eager 
bounty  of  Miss  Vane  and  Mr.  Corey,  representing 
that  more  would  be  a  burden  and  an  offence  to 
Barker.  Statira  and  his  mother  came  with  him  to 
take  leave  of  the  Sewells. 

They  dismounted  from  the  horse-car  at  the 
minister's  door;  and  he  saw,  with  sensibility,  the 
two  women  helping  Lemuel  off;  he  walked  with  a 
cane,  and  they  went  carefully  on  either  side  of  him. 
Sewell  hastened  to  meet  them  at  the  door  himself, 
and  he  was  so  much  interested  in  the  spectacle  of 
this  mutual  affection  that  he  failed  at  first  to 
observe  that  Mrs.  Barker  wore  the  skirts  of  occi 
dental  civilisation  instead  of  the  bloomers  which  he 
had  identified  her  with. 

"  She  says  she  's  goin'  to  put  'em  on  again  as  soon 


452  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

as  she  gets  back  to  Willoughby,"  the  younger  woman 
explained  to  Mrs.  Sewell  in  an  aside,  while  the 
minister  was  engaged  with  Lemuel  and  his  mother. 
"  But  I  tell  her  as  long  as  it  ain't  the  fashion  in 
Boston,  I  guess  she  hadn't  better,  he-e-e-re"  Statira 
had  got  on  her  genteel  prolongation  of  her  last 
syllables  again.  "I  guess  I  shall  get  along  with 
her.  She 's  kind  of  queer  when  you  first  get 
acquainted;  but  she's  real  good-heart-e-e-d."  She 
waft  herself  very  prettily  dressed,  and  though  she 
looked  thin,  and  at  times  gave  a  deep,  dismal  cough, 
she  was  so  bright  and  gay  that  it  was  impossible  not 
to  feel  hopeful  about  her.  She  became  very  con 
fidential  with  Mrs.  Sewell,  whom  she  apparently 
brevetted  Lemuel's  best  friend,  and  obliged  to  a 
greater  show  of  interest  in  him  than  she  had  ever 
felt.  She  told  her  the  whole  history  of  her  love 
affair,  and  of  how  much  'Manda  Grier  had  done  to 
help  it  on  at  first,  and  then  how  she  had  wanted  her 
to  break  off  with  Lemuel.  "But,"  she  concluded, 
"  /  think  we  're  goin'  to  get  along  real  nice  together. 
I  don't  know  as  we  shall  live  all  in  the  same 
hou-on-se;  I  guess  it'll  be  the  best  thing  for  Lem 
and  I  if  we  can  board  till  we  get  some  little  of  our 
health  back ;  I  'm  more  scared  for  him  than  what  I 
am  for  my-se-e-lf.  I  don't  presume  but  what  we  shall 
both  miss  the  city  some  ;  but  he  might  be  out  of  a  job 
all  winter  in  town;  I  shouldn't  want  he  should  go 
back  on  them  ca-a-rs.  Most  I  hate  is  leavin'  'Manda 
Grier,  she  is  the  one  that  I've  roomed  with  ever 
since  I  first  came  to  Boston  :  but  Lem  and  her  don't 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.  453 

get  on  very  well ;  they  hain't  really  either  of  'em  got 
anything  against  each  other  now,  but  they  don't  like 
very  we-Q-ll ;  and,  of  course,  I  got  to  have  the  friends 
that  he  wants  me  to  have,  and  that 's  what  'Manda 
Grier  says,  to-o-o ;  and  so  it 's  just  as  well  we  're 
goin'  to  be  where  they  won't  c/^-a-sh." 

She  talked  to  Mrs.  Sewell  in  a  low  voice  ;  but  she 
kept  her  eyes  upon  Lemuel  all  the  time ;  and  when 
Sewell  took  him  and  his  mother  the  length  of  the 
front  drawing-room  away,  she  was  quite  distraught, 
and  answered  at  random  till  he  came  back. 

Sewell  did  not  know  what  to  think.  Would  this 
dependence  warm  her  betrothed  to  greater  tender 
ness  than  he  now  showed,  or  would  its  excess  disgust 
him  1  He  was  not  afraid  that  Lemuel  would  ever 
be  unkind  to  her ;  but  he  knew  that  in  marriage 
kindness  was  not  enough.  He  looked  at  Lemuel, 
serious,  thoughtful,  refined  in  his  beauty  by  suffering ; 
and  then  his  eye  wandered  to  Statira's  delicate 
prettiness,  so  sweet,  so  full  of  amiable  cheerfulness, 
so  undeniably  light  and  silly.  What  chiefly 
comforted  him  was  the  fact  of  an  ally  whom  the 
young  thing  had  apparently  found  in  Lemuel's 
mother.  Whether  that  grim  personage's  ignorant 
pride  in  her  son  had  been  satisfied  with  a  girl  of 
Statira's  style  and  fashion,  and  proven  capableness 
in  housekeeping,  or  whether  some  fancy  for  butter 
fly  prettiness  lurking  in  the  fastnesses  of  the  old 
woman's  rugged  nature  had  been  snared  by  the  gay 
face  and  dancing  eyes,  it  was  apparent  that  she  at 
least  was  in  love  with  Statira.  She  allowed  herself 


454  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE. 

to  be  poked  about  and  rearranged  as  to  her  shawl 
and  the  narrow-brimmed  youthful  hat  which  she 
wore  on  the  peak  of  her  skull,  and  she  softened  to 
something  like  a  smile  at  the  touch  of  Statira's 
quick  hands. 

They  had  all  come  rather  early  to  make  their 
parting  visit  at  the  Sewells,  for  the  Barkers  were 
going  to  take  the  two  o'clock  train  for  Willonghby 
Pastures,  while  Statira  was  to  remain  in  Boston  till 
he  could  make  a  home  for  her.  Lemuel  promised  to 
write,  as  soon  as  he  should  be  settled,  and  tell  Sewell 
about  his  life  and  his  work  ;  and  Sewell,  beyond  ear 
shot  of  his  wife,  told  him  he  might  certainly  count 
upon  seeing  them  at  Willoughbyin  the  course  of  the 
next  summer.  They  all  shook  hands  several  times. 
Lemuel's  mother  gave  her  hand  from  under  the 
fringe  of  her  shawl,  standing  bolt  upright  at  arm's- 
length  off,  and  Sewell  said  it  felt  like  a  collection  of 
corn-cobs. 


XXXV. 

"WELL?"  said  Sewell's  wife,  when  they  were 
gone. 

"Well,"  he  responded;  and  after  a  moment  he 
said,  "  There 's  this  comfort  about  it  which  we  don't 
always  have  in  such  cases :  there  doesn't  seem  to  be 
anybody  else.  It  would  be  indefinitely  worse  if 
there  were." 

"Why,  of  course.  What  in  the  world  are  you 
thinking  about  1 " 

"  About  that  foolish  girl  who  came  to  me  with  her 
miserable  love-trouble.  I  declare,  I  can't  get  rid  of 
it.  I  feel  morally  certain  that  she  went  away  from 
me  and  dismissed  the  poor  fellow  who  was  looking 
to  her  love  to  save  him." 

"  At  the  cost  of  some  other  poor  creature  who  'd 
trusted  and  believed  in  him  till  his  silly  fancy 
changed  1  I  hope  for  the  credit  of  women  that  she 
did.  But  you  may  be  morally  certain  she  did  no 
thing  of  the  kind.  Girls  don't  give  up  all  their 
hopes  in  life  so  easily  as  that.  She  might  think 
she  would  do  it,  because  she  had  read  of  such 
things,  and  thought  it  was  fine,  but  when  it  came  to 
the  pinch,  she  wouldn't." 

455 


456  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

"I  hope  not.  If  she  did  she  would  commit  a 
great  error,  a  criminal  error." 

"  Well,  you  needn't  be  afraid.  Look  at  Mrs.  Tom 
Corey.  And  that  was  her  own  sister  !  " 

"  That  was  different.  Corey  had  never  thought 
of  her  sister,  much  less  made  love  to  her,  or 
promised  to  marry  her.  Besides,  Mrs.  Corey  had 
her  father  and  mother  to  advise  her,  and  support 
her  in  behaving  sensibly.  And  this  poor  creature 
had  nothing  but  her  own  novel  fed  fancies,  and  her 
crazy  conscience.  She  thought  that  because  she 
inflicted  suffering  upon  herself  she  was  acting 
unselfishly.  Eeally  the  fakirs  of  India  and  the 
Penitentes  of  New  Mexico  are  more  harmless ;  for 
they  don't  hurt  any  one  else.  If  she  has  forced 
some  poor  fellow  into  a  marriage  like  this  of 
Barker's  she 's  committed  a  deadly  sin.  She  ;d 
better  driven  him  to  suicide,  than  condemned  him  to 
live  a  lie  to  the  end  of  his  days.  No  doubt  she 
regarded  it  as  a  momentary  act  of  expiation.  That 's 
the  way  her  romances  taught  her  to  look  at  loveless 
marriage — as  something  spectacular,  transitory,  in 
stead  of  the  enduring,  degrading  squalor  that  it  is  ! " 

"  What  in  the  world  are  you  talking  about, 
David  1  I  should  think  you  were  a  novelist  your 
self,  by  the  wild  way  you  go  on  !  You  have  no 
proof  whatever  that  Barker  isn't  happily  engaged. 
I  'm  sure  he  's  got  a  much  better  girl  than  he  deserves, 
and  one  that's  fully  his  equal.  Slie^  only  too  fond 
of  that  dry  stick.  Such  a  girl  as  the  one  you 
described, — like  that  mysterious  visitor  of  yours, — 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     457 

what  possible  relation  could  she  have  with  him  ? 
She  was  a  lady  !  " 

"Yes,  yes!  Of  course,  it's  absurd.  But  every 
body  seems  to  be  tangled  up  with  everybody  else. 
My  dear,  will  you  give  me  a  cup  of  tea  1  I  think 
1 11  go  to  writing  at  once." 

Before  she  left  her  husband  to  order  his  tea  Mrs. 
Sewell  asked,  "And  do  you  think  you  have  got 
through  with  him  now  1  " 

"  I  have  just  begun  with  him,"  replied  Sewell. 

His  mind,  naturally  enough  in  connection  with 
Lemuel,  was  running  upon  his  friend  Evans,  and 
the  subject  they  had  once  talked  of  in  that  room. 
It  was  primarily  in  thinking  of  him  that  he  begun 
to  write  his  sermon  on  Complicity,  which  made  a 
great  impression  at  the  time,  and  had  a  more  lasting 
effect  as  enlarged  from  the  newspaper  reports,  and 
reprinted  in  pamphlet  form.  His  evolution  from 
the  text,  "Remember  them  that  are  in  bonds  as 
bound  with  them,"  of  a  complete  philosophy  of  life, 
was  humorously  treated  by  some  of  his  critics  as  a 
phase  of  Darwinism,  but  upon  the  whole  the  sermon 
met  with  great  favour.  It  not  only  strengthened 
Se well's  hold  upon  the  affections  of  his  own  con 
gregation,  but  carried  his  name  beyond  Boston,  and 
made  him.  the  topic  of  editorials  in  the  Sunday 
editions  of  leading  newspapers  as  far  off  as  Chicago. 
It  struck  one  of  those  popular  moods  of  intelligent 
sympathy  when  the  failure  of  a  large  class  of  under 
paid  and  worthy  workers  to  assert  their  right  to  a 
living  wage  against  a  powerful  monopoly  had  sent  a 


458  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;  OR, 

thrill  of  respectful  pity  through  every  generous 
heart  in  the  country ;  and  it  was  largely  supposed 
that  Sewell's  sermon  referred  indirectly  to  the 
telegraphers'  strike.  Those  who  were  aware  of  Us 
habit  of  seeking  to  produce  a  personal  rather  than 
a  general  effect,  of  his  belief  that  you  can  have  a 
righteous  public  only  by  the  slow  process  of  having 
righteous  men  and  women,  knew  that  he  meant 
something  much  nearer  home  to  each  of  his  hearers 
when  he  preached  the  old  Christ-humanity  to  them, 
and  enforced  again  the  lessons  that  no  one  for  good 
or  for  evil,  for  sorrow  or  joy,  for  sickness  or  health, 
stood  apart  from  his  fellows,  but  each  was  bound  to 
the  highest  and  the  lowest  by  ties  that  centred  in 
the  hand  of  God.  No  man,  he  said,  sinned  or 
suffered  to  himself  alone ;  his  error  and  his  pain 
darkened  and  afflicted  men  who  never  heard  of  his 
name.  If  a  community  was  corrupt,  if  an  age  was 
immoral,  it  was  not  because  of  the  vicious,  but  the 
virtuous  who  fancied  themselves  indifferent  specta 
tors.  It  was  not  the  tyrant  who  oppressed,  it  was 
the  wickedness  that  had  made  him  possible.  The 
gospel — Christ — God,  so  far  as  men  had  imagined 
him, — was  but  a  lesson,  a  type,  a  witness  from  ever 
lasting  to  everlasting  of  the  spiritual  unity  of  man. 
As  we  grew  in  grace,  in  humanity,  in  civilisation, 
our  recognition  of  this  truth  would  be  transfigured 
from  a  duty  to  a  privilege,  a  joy,  a  heavenly  rapture. 
Many  men  might  go  through  life  harmlessly  without 
realising  this,  perhaps,  but  sterilely  ;  only  those  who 
had  had  the  care  of  others  laid  upon  them,  lived 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     4"59 

usefully,  fruitfully.  Let  no  one  shrink  from  such  a 
burden,  or  seek  to  rid  himself  of  it.  Eather  let  him 
bind  it  fast  upon  his  neck,  and  rejoice  in  it.  The 
wretched,  the  foolish,  the  ignorant  whom  we  found 
at  every  turn,  were  something  more  ;  they  were  the 
messengers  of  God,  sent  to  tell  his  secret  to  any  that 
would  hear  it.  Happy  he  in  whose  ears  their  cry 
for  help  was  a  perpetual  voice,  for  that  man,  what 
ever  his  creed,  knew  God  and  could  never  forget 
him.  In  his  responsibility  for  his  weaker  brethren 
he  was  Godlike,  for  God  was  but  the  impersonation 
of  loving  responsibility,  of  infinite  and  never-ceasing 
care  for  us  all. 

When  Sewell  came  down  from  his  pulpit,  many 
people  came  up  to  speak  to  him  of  his  sermon. 
Some  of  the  women's  faces  showed  the  traces  of 
tears,  and  each  person  had  made  its  application 
to  himself.  There  were  two  or  three  who  had  heard 
between  the  words.  Old  Bromfield  Corey,  who  was 
coming  a  good  deal  more  to  church  since  his  eyes 
began  to  fail  him,  because  it  was  a  change  and  a 
sort  of  relief  from  being  read  to,  said — 

"  I  didn't  know  that  they  had  translated  it  Barker 
in  the  revised  version.  Well,  you  must  let  me  know 
how  he  's  getting  on,  Sewell,  and  give  me  a  chance 
at  the  revelation,  too,  if  he  ever  gets  troublesome 
to  you  again." 

Miss  Vane  was  standing  at  the  door  with  his  wife 
when  Sewell  came  out.  She  took  his  hand  and 
pressed  it. 


460  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE. 

"  Do  you  think  I  threw  away  my  chance  ? "  she 
demanded.  She  had  her  veil  down,  and  at  first 
Sewell  thought  it  was  laughter  that  shook  her  voice, 
but  it  was  not  that. 

He  did  not  know  quite  what  to  say,  but  he  did 
say,  "He  was  sent  to  me." 

As  they  walked  off  alone,  his  wife  said — 

"  Well,  David,  I  hope  you  haven't  preached  away 
all  your  truth  and  righteousness." 

"I  know  what  you  mean,  my  dear,"  answered 
Sewell  humbly.  He  added,  "  You  shall  remind  me 
if  I  seem  likely  to  forget."  But  he  concluded 
seriously,  "  If  I  thought  I  could  never  do  anything 
more  for  Barker,  I  should  be  very  unhappy ;  I 
should  take  it  as  a  sign  that  I  had  been  recreant  to 
my  charge. " 


XXXVI. 

THE  minister  heard  directly  from  Barker  two  or 
three  times  during  the  winter,  and  as  often  through 
Statira,  who  came  to  see  Mrs.  Sewell.  Barker  had 
not  got  the  place  he  had  hoped  for  at  once,  but  he  had 
got  a  school  in  the  country  a  little  way  off,  and  he 
was  doing  something ;  and  he  expected  to  do  better. 

The  winter  proved  a  very  severe  one.  "I  guess 
it 's  just  as  well  I  stayed  in  town,"  said  Statira,  the 
last  time  she  came,  with  a  resignation  which  Mrs. 
Sewell,  fond  of  the  ideal  in  others  as  most  ladies  are, 
did  not  like.  "  'Aland a  Grier  says  'twould  killed  me 
up  there  ;  and  I  d'  know  but  what  it  would.  I  done 
so  well  here,  since  the  cold  weather  set  in  that 
'Manda  Grier  she  thinks  I  hadn't  better  get  married 
right  away  ;  well,  not  till  it  comes  summer,  anyway. 
I  tell  her  I  guess  she  don't  want  I  should  get 
married  at  all,  after  all  she  done  to  help  it  along 
first  off.  Her  and  Air.  Barker  don't  seem  to  get 
along  very -well." 

Now  that  Statira  felt  a  little  better  acquainted 
with  Mrs.  Sewell,  she  dropped  the  genteel  elongation 
of  her  final  syllables,  and  used  such  vernacular  forms 
of  speech  as  came  first  to  her.  The  name  of  'Manda 

461 


462  THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE  ;   OR, 

Grier  seemed  to  come  in  at  every  fourth  word  with 
her,  and  she  tired  Mrs.  Sewell  with  visits  whicli  she 
appeared  unable  to  bring  to  a  close  of  herself. 

A  long  relief  from  them  ended  in  an  alarm  for  her 
health  with  Mrs.  Sewell,  who  went  to  find  her;  She 
found  her  still  better  than  before,  and  Statira  frankly 
accounted  for  her  absence  by  saying  that  'Manda 
thought  she  had  better  not  come  any  more  till  Mrs. 
Sewell  returned  some  of  her  calls.  She  laughed,  and 
then  she  said — 

"  I  don't  know  as  you  'd  found  me  here  if  you  'd 
come  much  later.  'Manda  Grier  don't  want  I  should 
be  here  in  the  east  winds,  now  it  'a  coming  spring  so 
soon  ;  and  she  's  heard  of  a  chance  at  a  box  factory 
in  Philadelphia.  She  wants  I  should  go  there  with 
her,  and  I  don't  know  but  what  it  u'ould  be  about 
the  best  thing." 

Mrs.  Sewell  could  not  deny  the  good  sense  of  the 
plan,  though  she  was  sensible  of  liking  Statira  less 
and  less  for  it. 

The  girl  continued  :  "  Lem — Mr.  Barker,  I  should 
say — wants  I  should  come  up  there,  out  the  east 
winds.  But  'Manda  Grier  she 's  opposed  to  it :  she 
thinks  I'd  ought  to  have  more  of  a  mild  climate, 
and  he  better  come  down  there  and  get  a  school  if  he 
wants  me  too,"  Statira  broke  into  an  impartial  little 
titter.  "I'm  sure  I  don't  know  which  of  'em  '11 
win  the  day  !  " 

Mrs.  Sewell 's  report  of  this  speech  brought  a 
radiant  smile  of  relief  to  Sewell's  face.  "Ah,  well, 
then  !  That  settles  it  !  I  feel  perfectly  sure  that 


THE  APPRENTICESHIP  OF  LEMUEL  BARKER.     463 

'Manda  Grier  will  win  the  day.  That  poor,  sick, 
flimsy  little  Statira  is  completely  under  'Manda 
Grier's  thumb,  and  will  do  just  what  she  says,  now 
that  there's  no  direct  appeal  from  her  will  to 
Barker's  ;  they  will  never  be  married.  Don't  you 
see  that  it  was  'Manda  Grier's  romance  in  the  begin 
ning,  and  that  when  she  came  to  distrust,  to  dislike 
Barker,  she  came  to  dislike  her  romance  too — to 
hate  it  ? " 

"Well,  don't  you  romance  him,  David,"  said  Mrs. 
Sewell,  only  conditionally  accepting  his  theory. 

Yet  it  may  be  offered  to  the  reader  as  founded  in 
probability  and  human  nature.  In  fact,  he  may  be 
assured  here  that  the  marriage  which  eventually  took 
place  was  not  that  of  Lemuel  with  Statira  ;  though 
how  the  union,  which  was  not  only  happiness  for 
those  it  joined,  but  whatever  is  worthier  and  better 
in  life  than  happiness,  came  about,  it  is  aside  from 
the  purpose  of  this  story  to  tell,  and  must  be  left  for 
some  future  inquiry. 


THE   END. 


BENJAMIN  H.  TICKNOR.          THOMAS  B.  TICKNOR.          GEORGE  F.  GODFREY. 


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Ticknor  and  Company.  11 


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12  A  List  of  Books  Published  by 

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14  A  List  of  Booh  Published  by 


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Ticknor  and  Company.  15 


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1C  A  List  of  Booh  Published 


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Ticknor  and  Company.  17 


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the  Night. 


20  A  List  of  Books  Published  by 


THE   HOLIDAY   BOOK   OF    THE    SEASON. 

SCOTT'S  THE  LAY  OF  THE  LAST  MINSTREL.  An  entirely 
new  edition  of  this  famous  and  popular  poem,  from  new  plates,  with 
nearly  one  hundred  new  illustrations  by  leading  American  artists. 
Elegantly  and  appropriately  bound,  with  full  gilt  edges.  In  box. 
Cloth,  $600;  padded  calf,  tree-calf,  or  antique  morocco,  §10.00.  A 
few  copies  in  crushed  Levant,  with  silk  linings,  $25.00. 

"  The  Lay  of  the  Last  Minstrel"  is  larger  than  its  predecessors,  the  Holi 
day  volumes  published  under  Mr.  Anthony's  supervision,  and  its  broad  and 
handsome  pages  offer  very  favorable  opportunities  for  the  display  of  the 
illustrations,  which  are  masterpieces  of  modern  engraving. 

The  immediate  and  permanent  success  of  ''  The  Lady  of  the  Lake," 
"  Marmion,"  etc.,  has  encouraged  the  publishers  to  bring  out  this  not  less 
popular  and  famous  poem.  It  is  produced  in  the  same  style,  and  with  the 
same  careful  and  elaborate  style  of  illustration,  regardlr.=s  of  cost,  while  Mr. 
Anthony's  skilful  supervision  is  sufficient  guarantee  that  the  work  is  elegant 
and  tasteful  as  well  as  correct.  The  publishers  feel  assured  that  the  work 
in  its  new  and  beautiful  shape  will  be  the  Leading  Holiday  Book  of 
the  Year.  

THE  PETERKIN  PAPERS.  By  LtTOKETTA  P.  HALE.  New  Holiday 
edition,  revised  and  enlarged,  uniform  with  "  Davy  and  the  Goblin." 
Square  4to.  Illustrated  with  a  great  number  of  new  pictures.  $1.50. 
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of  this  new  and  enlarged  edition,  with  new  illustrations  and  type.  "  The 
Lady  from  Philadelphia,"  "  Agamemnon, ''  "Solomon  John,"  and  other 
characters  of  these  stories  have  become  household  words  in  thousands  of 
American  families  ;  and  the  publication  of  a  worthy  and  comely  edition  of 
so  delightful  a  classic  will  be  hailed  with  joy  by  many  old  friends  and  new. 

MURAL  PAINTING.  By  FREDERIC  CROWNIXSHIELD.  1vol.  Square 
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This  series  of  papers  has  excited  great  interest  and  attention  in  "  The 
American  Architect  ;  :?  and  in  its  present  enlarged  and  amended  form,  with 
many  new  illustrations,  is  still  more  valuable. 

THE    VIRGINIA    CAMPAIGN    OF    GENERAL    POPE    IN     1862. 

Being  Volume  II.  of  Papers  read  before  the  Military  Historical  Soci 
ety  of  Massachusetts.     With  Maps  and  Plans.    1  vol.    8vo.    $3.00. 

A  careful  and  dispassionate  account  of  the  great  retreat  from  the  Rapidan 
to  the  Potomac,  with  the  stories  of  its  terrible  battles,  prepared  by  prom 
inent  military  officers,  and  dealing  with  the  Second  Bull-Run  campaign,  the 
Fitz-John  Porter  affair,  and  other  interesting  matters. 

SONGS  AND  SATIRES.  A  volume  of  poems.  By  JAMES  JEFFREY 
ROCHE.  1  vol.  12mo.  $1.00. 

The  range  and  versatility  of  these  poems  add  to  their  other  attractions,  and 
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in  "  Life,!'  and  other  publications,  are  of  singular  delicacy  and  originality, 
and  the  best  of  them  are  incorporated  in  this  volume,  together  with  many 
heretofore  unpublished  poems. 

GENIUS  IN  SUNSHINE  AND  IN  SHADOW.  By  M.  M.  BALLOU, 
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Mr.  Ballou  has  for  many  years  been  known  as  one  of  the  most  industrious, 
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latest  work)  is  a  peculiarly  interesting  one,  full  of  anecdotes  and  memora 
bilia,  which  set  forth  the  intimate  inner  lives  of  the  world's  heroes  and 
notables.  They  have  been  gathered  from  the  most  recondite  sources,  and 
skilfully  massed  in  attractive  array,  forming  a  great  collection,  that  is  at 
once  valuable  and  interesting. 


Ticlcnor  and  Company.  21 

IN  OCTOBER. 

A    WONDERFUL    WORK    OF    ART. 

Mrs.  Browning's  !Love  Sonnets. 

SONNETS  FROM  THE  PORTUGUESE.  By  ELIZABETH  BAH- 
RETT  BROWNING.  Illustrated,  by  LUDVIG  SANDOE  IPSEN.  1  vol. 
Oblong  folio  (pages  13  *  1C  inches),  beautifully  bound,  gilt  top.  $15.00. 

This  magnificent  work  has  been  a  labor  of  love  for  years  with  the  artist, 
who  is  the  prince  of  decorators,  and  has  lavished  upon  it  all  the  resources  of 
his  imagination  and  skill.  The  result  is  a  magnificent  monument  to  the 
poems  that  are  enshrined  therein,  and  a  series  of  designs,  the  equals  of 
which  as  a  mere  treasury  of  decoration  and  invention,  apart  from  their  sig 
nificance  in  illustrating  the  immortal  verse  of  Mrs.  Browning,  have  never 
been  issued  in  America.  Each  sonnet  is  prefaced  by  a  richly  ornamental 
half-title,  on  a  full  page,  and  is  surrounded  by  a  handsome  border,  emble 
matic  in  its  design  and  composition.  Mr.  Ipsen  has  for  many  years  been 
recognized  as  the  foremost  leader  of  art-decoration  for  books,  both  inside 
and  outside,  and  has  set  more  fashions  for  imitation  than  any  other  artist. 
This  book  is  his  crowning  work,  and  will  afford  an  inexhaustible  treasury  of 
decoration  for  students  of  art,  and  a  life-study  for  all  lovers  of  beauty  and 
symmetry.  Mrs.  Browning's  sonnets  are  among  the  noblest  productions 
of  ancient  or  modern  literature ;  and  their  literary  excellence  and  incom 
parable  beauty  of  diction  insure  for  them  certain  immortality. 


RECOLLECTIONS    OF    EMINENT    MEN,   and    Other    Papers. 

By  EDWIN  PERCY  WHIPPLE.  1  vol.  Crown  8vo.  With  new  steel 
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A  new  book  by  Mr.  Whipple  is  a  literary  event ;  and  so  many  years  have 
elapsed  since  his  last  publication,  that  the  interest  will  be  more  intense  in 
the  present  volume,  which  contains  some  of  his  most  charming  and  char 
acteristic  papers,  including  monographs  on  Sumner,  Motley,  Agassiz,  Choate, 
and  George  Eliot. 

STORIES  OF  ART  AND  ARTISTS.  By  CLARA  ERSKINE  CLEM- 
KST.  1  vol.  8vo.  Profusely  illustrated.  In  cloth.  $4.00;  in  half 
parchment,  $4.50. 

This  work,  historical  and  descriptive,  gives  a  complete  re'sume"  of  the  His 
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of  all  the  great  artists,  with  portraits  and  reproductions  of  their  works.  The 
author  is  well  known  as  a  charming  writer  and  an  acknowledged  authority 
on  art  criticism  and  history. 

PERSIA  AND  THE  PERSIANS.  By  Hon.  S.  G.  W.  BENJAMIN,  late 
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The  author  is,  perhaps,  the  best  living  authority  on  Persia, and  this  book 
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his  residence  as  United  States  Minister,  combining  novel  and  entertaining 
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value  His  rare  skill  as  a  landscape  painter  has  availed  to  give  many  choice 
pictures  of  the  great  Asiatic  realm,  with  its  stores  of  poetry  and  legend,  its 
strange  customs,  and  its  romantic  scenery  and  architecture. 


22  A  List  of  Pooh  Published  by 


STEADFAST.    A  Novel.    By  ROSE  TERRY  COOKE,  author  of  "Some 
body's  Neighbors."    1  vol.     12mo.    $1.50. 

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signing  herself  X,  writes  to  the  Advertiser  in  an  absurd  panic,  lest, '  in 
honoring  Mrs.  Hose  Terry  Cooke,  we  shall,  as  in  Hawthorne's  case,  wait  until 
Old  England  tells  New  England  what  a  genius  she  is  neglecting.'  As  it  has 
for  years  been  generally  recognized  and  heartily  acknowledged  that  Mrs. 
Cooke  has  written  the  best  stories  of  New-England  country-life  ever  pub 
lished,  the  fear  of '  X  '  seems  somewhat  needless." 

CONFESSIONS   AND  CRITICISMS.     By   JULIAN  HAWTHORNE. 
1  vol.    12rno. 

A  series  of  very  delightful  essays  and  papers,  -with  reminiscences  and 
other  memorable  papers,  prepared  by  one  of  the  most  skilful  and  interesting 
of  American  authors,  and  calculated  to  attract  and  keep  the  attention  of  all 
readers.  It  includes  a  great  variety  of  valuable  miscellany,  and  several 
papers  that  have  already  become  classic  among  people  of  cultivation  and 
acumen. 

THE  HOUSE  AT  HIGH   BRIDGE.     By  EDGAR  FAWCETT.    1  vol. 
12mo.     $1.50. 

The  announcement  of  an  entirely  new  novel  from  the  pen  of  the  writer  of 
"  Adventures  of  a  Widow,''  etc. ,  is  sufficient  to  pique  the  curiosity  of  many 
readers,  who  find  in  this  author  the  best  traits  of  modern  literature.  "  The 
House  at  High  Bridge  "  is  an  entirely  new  work,  not  having  been  published 
serially. 


FOR    LATER    ISSUE. 

YE    OLDEN    TIME    SERIES.     The  following  are  forthcoming  vol 
umes:  — 

"  Literary  Curiosities." 

"  New-England  Music  in  the  18th  and  in  the  beginning  of  the  19th 

Century." 

"Travel  in  Old  Times,  with  Some  Account  of  Stages,  Taverns,"  etc. 
"  Curiosities  of  Politics,  among  the  Old  Federalists  and  Republicans." 

NORA    PERRY'S    POEMS. 

A  new  volume  of  poems  by  Nora  Perry  is  now  in  press,  and  its  publication 
will  be  awaited  with  great  interest  by  the  thousands  of  admirers  of  this  bril 
liant  and  piquant  writer. 

A  new  edition  of  "Her  Lover's  Friend  "  and  "After  the  Ball "  (two 
volumes  in  one)  is  now  in  press. 

RANKELL'S    REMAINS.    A  Novel.   By  BARRETT  WENDELL,  author 
of  '•  The  Duchess  Emilia."    1  vol.    12mo. 

The  remarkable  success  of  Barrett  Wendell's  ' '  The  Duchess  Emilia,"  a 
romance  of  the  Colonna  family  in  papal  Rome,  gives  the  best  reason  to  hope 
for  a  similar  (or  even  greater)  triumph  for  his  new  novel,  on  which  he  has 
been  engaged  for  two  5Tears.  That  it  will  be  a  strong  and  original  work,  no 
one  who  has  read  Wendell's  previous  story  can  for  a  moment  doubt. 


Ticknor  and  Company.  23 


A  MURAMASA  BLADE.  A  Story  of  Feudalism  in  Old  Japan.  By 
Louis  WERTHEIMBER.  1vol.  8vo.  Beautifully  illustrated  by  Jap 
anese  artists.  $3.00. 

Mr.  "Wertheimber,  of  a  scholarly  Austrian  family,  went  to  Japan  about 
the  year  1870,  and  spent  many  years  there,  in  the  service  of  the  Japanese 
Government.  He  was  an  extensive  traveller  among  the  inland  districts  and 
villages  ;  and  contributed  many  articles  and  series  to  the  Japan  Mail,  and 
other  publications.  The  present  book  is  a  romance  of  the  sword,  full  of 
charming  local  color,  true  to  life  as  it  is  in  Japan,  and  full  of  deep  and  en 
chaining  interest.  Its  mechanical  make-up  is  sumptuous  in  every  respect. 

ACNES  SURRIAGE.  A  Novel.  By  EDWIN  LASSETTER  BYNNER 
author  of  "  Damen's  Ghost,"  "  Penelope's  Suitors,"  etc.  $1.50. 

This  new  novel  by  the  author  of  "  Tritons  ''  and  "  Nimport  "  will  have  a 
large  constituency  of  readers  and  admirers. 

SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS   OF  NOTED   PERSONS.    By  Hon.  J.  S. 

MORRILL.      $1.50. 

The  well-known  and  erudite  Senator  from  Vermont  has,  in  this  work, 
condensed  the  fruits  of  years  of  curious  research  in  a  strange  and  unfamiliar 
field.  The  result  is  a  rarely  entertaining  volume  of  great  value  to  all 
scholars  and  public  men,  and  interesting  to  all  readers.  A  small  edition 
was  privately  printed  some  time  since,  and  met  with  such  praise  and  appre 
ciation  that  Senator  Mom  11  has  since  carefully  revised  and  materially 
augmented  it  for  publication. 

THE  MINISTER'S  CHARGE.  By  W.  D.  Ho  WELLS,  author  of  "The 
Rise  of  Silas  Lapham,"  "  Indian  Summer,"  etc.  $1.50. 

"In  this  great  novel  of  the  people  Henry  James  finds  that  Mr.  Howells 
touches  high-water  mark  ;  and  sees  an  important  and  valuable  work  in  this 
minute  and  subtle  registering  of  the  heavy-witted  countryman's  slow  de 
velopment  under  city  conditions.  However  that  may  be,  Howells's  pure, 
inimitable  fun  is  enough  to  carry  any  story  he  may  write.  Like  all  true 
fun,  this  has  a  most  searching  pathos  all  the  time  just  at  hand;  and  never 
is  the  real  dignity  of  character  of  this  actual  Yankee  forgotten  or  trifled 
with."  —  Boston  Transcript. 

STORIES  AND  SKETCHES.  By  JOHN  BOYLE  O'REILLY,  editor 
of  the  Pilot,  author  of  "  Moondyne,"  etc.  12mo.  $1.50. 

The  great  popularity  of  the  author,  and  the  intrinsic  merit  and  interest 
of  his  writings,  will  insure  a  warm  reception  to  this  collection  of  his  latest 
f  and  best  works. 

SAFE  BUILDING.    By  Louis  DE  COPPET  BERG.    1vol.    Square  8vo. 


24       A  List  of  Books  Published  by   Ticlcnor  $  Co. 


THE 

MEMORIAL  HISTORY  OF  BOSTON, 

In  Four  Volumes.     Quarto. 

With  more  than  500  Illustrations  by  famous  artists  and  engravers,  all 
made  for  this  work. 

Edited  by  JUSTIN  WINSOR,  LIBRARIAN  OF  HARVARD  UNIVERSITY. 

Among  the  contributors  are  :  — 

Gov.  JOHN  D.  LONG,  Dr.  0.  TV.  HOLMES, 

Hon.  CHARLES  FRANCIS  ADAMS,  JOHN  G.  WHITTIER, 

Rev.  PHILLIPS  BROOKS,  D.D.,  Rev.  J.  F.  CLARKE,  D.D., 

Rev.  E.  E.  HALE,  D.D.,  Key.  A.  P.  PEABODY,  D.D., 

Hon.  ROBERT  C.  WINTHROP,  Col.  T.  \V.  HIGGINSON, 

Hon.  J.  HAMMOND  TRUMBULL,  Professor  ASA  GRAY, 

Admiral  G.  H.  PREBLE,  Gen.  F.  W.  PALFREY, 
HENRY  CABOT  LODGE. 


VOLUME  I.  treats  of  the  Geology,  Fauna,  and  Flora ;  the  Voyages  and  Maps  of 
the  Northmen,  Italians,  Captain  John  Smith,  and  the  Plymouth  Settlers  ; 
the  Massachusetts  Company,  Puritanism,  and  the  Aborigines  ;  the  Lit 
erature,  Life,  and  Chief  Families  of  the  Colonial  Period. 

VOL.  II.  treats  of  the  Royal  Governors  ;  French  and  Indian  Wars ;  Witches 
and  Pirates;  The  Religion,  Literature,  Customs,  and  Chief  Families  of  the 
Provincial  Period. 

VOL.  III.  treats  of  the  Revolutionary  Period  and  the  Conflict  around  Boston ; 
and  the  Statesmen,  Sailors,  and  Soldiers,  the  Topography,  Literature,  and 
Life  of  Boston  during  that  time  ;  and  also  of  the  Last  Hundred  Years' 
History,  the  War  of  1812,  Abolitionism,  and  the  Press. 

VOL.  IV.  treats  of  the  Social  Life,  Topography,  and  Landmarks,  Industries, 
Commerce,  Railroads,  and  Financial  History  of  this  Century  in  Boston  ; 
with  Monographic  Chapters  on  Boston's  Libraries,  Women,  Science,  Art, 
Music,  Philosophy,  Architecture,  Charities,  etc. 

%*  Sold  by  subscription  only.     Send  for  a  Prospectus  to  the 
Publishers, 

TICKNOR    AND     COMPANY,    Boston. 


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